


Demon Exorcist

by Siobhan_Daley



Category: D.Gray-man
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-04-25
Updated: 2017-04-26
Packaged: 2018-10-24 00:45:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 29,976
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10730697
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Siobhan_Daley/pseuds/Siobhan_Daley
Summary: I was born to fight this Holy War. For the last twelve years, I've fought as an Exorcist for the Black Order without a second thought. I fought alongside with my comrades, whether we got along or not, obeyed the rules, fought akuma, and recovered Innocence. Unlike many, I never really thought about doing anything else, because I didn't know anything else. I was made for this war.





	1. A Typical Morning

_I was trapped in blackness. Darkness with no substance. As I tried to focus, a transparent checkered floor materialized beneath my feet and candles suspended in the inky darkness. Like a world made of the thinnest glass, it felt like everything would shatter at the slightest touch._

_"Akumako!" I turned to see a blue-haired girl running towards me. Looking at her face, I felt like I should remember her, but I couldn't. To my eyes, she was as frail-looking and glasslike as everything else in this dimension. Yet once she reached me, she hugged me as if I was the one who would float away. "I finally found you! Will you come home with me now, Akumako?"_

_"Sorry, who are you?" I asked her._

_"It's me, ****,” The girl's voice disappeared when she spoke her name. “Don't you remember me?"_

_"I'm sorry," I told her, "But I don't know who you are. I don't even know where I am." The girl drew back sorrowfully._

_"You're in a dream, Akumako. I've been trying to find you here for so long. How could you forget?" "Forget what?" "Me! Did you forget **** too? And *******? *****? *****? Everyone?" I could only assume she was listing off names, for I couldn’t hear them. "Akumako…"_

* * *

 

I woke up with a start, drenched in cold sweat. The voice in my dream echoed against the inside of my skull, pounding at my temples. Similar nightmares had been coming more and more often, and they were getting harder to escape. I was even starting to hear it long after I’d woken up.

_I'm still here, Akumako…_

Ignoring the Voice, I abandoned the thought of going back to sleep and donned my Exorcist's uniform. I felt around my right eye to check whether or not my eyepatch was still covering my eye. Upon finding that it was right where it should be, I left my room and groggily made my way down to the lab, assuming the Science Division would be needing help again.

"Up already, Freak?" a cynical, yet not terribly threatening voice said from behind me.

"Good morning to you too,” I groaned, already well aware of who was behind me. I turned around to see his usual grim expression. Not once had I ever seen Yu Kanda smile. "So, where're you headed?" I asked, pointlessly hoping he might actually want to be pleasant for once.

"Why would you care?"

"It's called conversation, idiot."

Kanda scoffed, "Why would I want to have a conversation with you?" He turned on his heel and walked away in his typical dismissive, arrogant manner.

I glared at him, muttering, "I should say the same to you." As I watched him leave, I shook my head in disappointment, sincerely wishing we could learn to be civil with each other. Like that would ever happen.

 

The Science Division was in its usual state of desperation and insatiable thirst for coffee… Assuming they were still alive under those mountains of paperwork. Clearly some clutz had knocked them over again. The only sign of anything living was someone's hand sticking out from the very bottom of one pile and Komui's unmistakable zombie-like moan, "Coffee..."

I sighed, somewhere between amused and dismayed, "Again? How did you guys get stuck in this mess?" I pushed my red bangs away from my eyepatch. "Nevermind. I don't want to know." I calmly began gathering up papers and re-stacking them, not even attempting to put them in the correct order. "Are you going to crawl out of there, or do I have to dig you out again?" All of the buried personnel quickly started shuffling out from their paper tombs, not eager for a repeat of the last time I had to excavate them all from their dreaded paperwork.

Johnny whimpered, "Please don't make us do our work in tubs of ice water again! I was sick for a week after that!"

"Don't worry Johnny. I won't." Just before the little guy could breathe a sigh of relief, I added, "I think next time I'll send the Komlin in here to ‘help’ you instead." All of the men shuddered, their skin obviously crawling at the thought of such a punishment. They each quickly wrestled their way free of their paperwork and began cleaning the mess up. The whole process took around an hour, but eventually the entire office was clean again.

"So, Akumako, what brings you to my office today?" Komui said cheerfully.

Reever protested, "What do you mean, 'your office'?! We all work in here!"

"Right, Reever, whatever. So, why did you come down here?" Having known the man since I was a kid, I was pretty used to his antics. Even so, sometimes I couldn’t help but shake my head at Komui’s ridiculousness.

"I came down to help, as usual. I figured you all were drowning in paperwork. Didn’t expect it literally though."

"Ah, I see. That's nice of you. Does that mean your Innocence has been holding up well, then?"

I cringed when he mentioned the Innocence in my body. "Yeah. Everything is fine with it! Nothing's wrong," I assured him. In reality, my Innocence had been acting strangely. I had a pretty high synchronization rate, according to Hevlaska. However, during training against akuma dolls, it had begun changing form, unexpectedly and against my will. Sometimes it wouldn't activate at all, or it would look distorted or discoloured. Even so, I preferred training difficulties over Komui's maintenance.

"Oh, that's good. I’d still like to have a look at it today though," said Komui, "I know you've had problems with it before, and it’s better safe than sorry. I’d also like to take you down and have Hevlaska take a look at your Innocence to see if your synchro-rate has changed at all. Sound good?"

Good? Not so much. Inevitable? Unfortunately. Komui had been running tests and maintenance checks on my Innocence at least once a month for as long as I could remember. None of my attempts to get out of them worked. Even being sent on a mission only served to delay my appointment. "Fine, Komui. Let's get the exam over-with. Might as well do it now, rather than have it hanging over my head all day."

The eccentric supervisor sprung out of his chair and ran into one of the smaller rooms that branched off of the main office. He reemerged wearing a safety helmet and carrying his giant drill, amongst other horrific tools he used to repair parasitic Innocence. I shuddered, but willingly followed Komui down the hall to the room used as an O.R. for parasitic-type Exorcists, like myself. "Please activate your Innocence for me, Akumako."

I did as he asked, letting the urge to destroy take hold in my mind. This time, the Innocence seemed to activate properly. Even now, it was almost foreign to me, feeling the black cross embedded between my shoulder blades warm up and trigger the pearly armoured plates covering my arms and shoulders, the spiky crenellations on my shoulders, and the slender, wicked claws crowning each of my fingers. Komui examined my weapon closely, poking and prodding in spots, but finding no flaws. “Looks good. How’s your secondary activation?” Upon request, I shifted from my basic form to my secondary, trading the sharp talons for plainly armoured hands and a pair of scythe-like blades curving up out of the back of my forearms. Once again, he examined my weapon and seemed satisfied. "Wonderful! Any problems with either of them?"

“Not that I’ve noticed,” I lied.

“That’s good. Have you noticed any changes in its behaviour? Any signs it might evolve a new form again?”

“Nope. Don’t think so,” I lied again.

“Alright. Go ahead and shut it down then. We can go see Hevlaska now.” I gladly deactivated my Innocence and followed Komui to the elevator. With the flick of a switch, Komui and I plummeted to the very bottom of the tower that housed the Black Order. The elevator screeched to a halt in front of Hevlaska, the keeper of the Innocence.

"Akumako… I am glad to see you again," said Hevlaska, "Do you need me to check your synchronization rate again?"

"Yes, Hevlaska. I do. I want to see if there is any change," I replied to her, switching to my more formal way of speaking, as I often did with Hevlaska. The giant being lifted me up to get a better look at my Innocence. No matter how many times Hevlaska examined me, the sense of something probing my insides remained bizarre.

"Let me see… 19%...23%...42%...66%...85%...93%...Yes, 93% is still your maximum synchronization rate," Hevlaska confirmed.

"Great. Thank you, Hevlaska. I will be going now. Komui, would you let me off near the cafeteria? I haven't eaten yet."

Komui responded quickly, "Yes, of course. You must be starving! We'll be there in a moment."

"Komui, would you please return here when you have a moment? There is something I’d like to discuss with you," Hevlaska requested before Komui could zip us away, "It is important that you hear it."

Komui nodded then flicked a switch, sending us flying towards the upper levels of the tower. It was still early, so I didn't see many people as we whizzed past each floor. I felt the elevator begin to slow down as the doors all began to come into focus. We stopped in front of the hallway that eventually branched off into the cafeteria. "Alrighty, here’s your stop," said Komui, "I’ve gotta get back to work. If you want to come help out, we'll give you free coffee!"

I leapt off of the elevator onto the solid floor. Before I took off down the hall, I turned back to Komui and told him, "Sorry, Komui, it's a tempting offer, but I already get free coffee!" I turned again and sprinted, laughing, away down the hall.

If I closed my eyes, I could almost pretend I was a kid again, running down a cobblestone road in a normal little town, living a normal little life.


	2. Kanda Hates Me

I had woken up well before dawn, so by the time I got to the cafeteria, the sun was only just peeking over the mountains in the distance. The huge arching windows provided an absolutely breathtaking view of the surrounding landscape. The tower was up on a cliff, after all. I rarely got up this early, so I never got to see the sunrise. I closed my uncovered left eye, memorizing the beautiful scenery outside. However, the image I conjured was not of what I just saw, but of a solitary, snowy mountain. _Huh,_ I thought, somewhat puzzled, _I wonder which mountain that is. It looks familiar..._

Of course, before I could think recall, my stomach gave a loud whine, reminding me why I was there in the first place. I grumbled, "Fine, stomach. Shut up. I'll go get some food. Excuse me for enjoying the view…" I crossed the hall and pushed the cafeteria doors open, revealing the mostly empty room. I counted two finders and one other Exorcist: Kanda.

"Mornin', Akumako!" Jerry greeted me from the kitchen, "You're up early. What can I make for ya', little lady?" Jerry was one of the few people I really considered a friend in the Black Order. Ever since I came here as a little kid, I could confide in Jerry and trust that he wouldn’t blab about it to everyone else. Of course, there’s also the fact that he fed me. With my enormous appetite, it was hard finding people who were willing to make food for me.

"Let me see… I'll have two large bowls of jasmine rice - make that _extra_ large -, three squid steaks, salted salmon, twenty mochi cakes, two bowls of udon, one large bowl of tonkotsu ramen, some soba noodles and lots of boiled shiitake mushrooms," I told Jerry, "Oh! I'd also like fifteen onigiri, and three bowls of beef-and-egg donburi. I know it's only breakfast, but I'd like a really large suama for dessert with some amanatto, and do you think you could make me some konpeito? I like those. And a dozen dango."

Jerry laughed, "It might take me a little while, but I'll get it done. You just hang tight until it's ready. Ya' want a red bean bun while you wait? I know you like 'em." The flamboyant Indian man held out the said bun on a plate to me, which I took with a grin.

I smiled gratefully. "Thanks, Jerry!" Glancing around the huge room, I decided to sit right across from Kanda, just to bother him. It was pretty clear that he hated being around me. I liked pestering him, which he found annoying, but from the first day we met, he made it clear that he loathed me. As far as I could tell, it was at least in part due to my supposed ‘cursed eye’ that I kept hidden under my eyepatch. I partly wore it because some of the things he said about my eye stung, and naive little me hoped that if I hid it, he’d be nice to me, but I could also see that a number of people found my gaze unnerving. Granted, sometimes I liked that.

For five solid minutes, I sat across the table staring at Kanda while nibbling on my bean bun while he ignored me. After a while, he started glancing up from his soba noodles uncomfortably.

"Why the hell are you staring at me, woman?" Kanda snapped irritably after some time of me watching him eat.

I shrugged, "I dunno. Maybe I just like looking at your face." I said in my mind, _Mugen in 3…2…_ Just as I reached one, the sharp tip of Kanda's beloved katana stabbed through the piece of my bun that I had left to eat. I let go of it to see whether or not it would stay on the blade, and when it did, I continued eating the bun like it was a Mugen-kabab. As intended, this seemed to piss Kanda off further.

Kanda slammed his fists and Mugen on the table and stood up, glaring viciously. "Can I not go anywhere without having to deal with you?" He yelled at me, gaining the attention of the people that were starting to file into the room, "Wherever I go, whether I'm in this damned tower or on a mission, either you follow me on your own or Komui sends you after me!" I could feel the startled looks of the finders behind me, but I kept my voice and expressions completely calm. No point in getting upset, right?

"Actually, I usually don't follow you on purpose, Kanda. Even if I did, do you have a problem with my company?"

"Yes, I do!"

"And what might that be?" Kanda opened and closed his mouth a few times as if he were trying to find the words he wanted, but couldn't. I raised my blood-red eyebrows, waiting for a response. "Well? Spit it out, Kanda. What’s it matter? There’s not many rude comments you haven’t thrown at me yet." Kanda still didn't respond. Instead, he just walked away, leaving the rest of his soba noodles behind. One of these days, I'm going to find myself missing my head. I'm sure of it.

 

Kanda's POV

I stormed out of the cafeteria, scaring a group of lab techs on their way to breakfast with my presumably angry expression. Knowing I wouldn’t be disturbed there, I went back to my room and needlessly slammed the door shut behind me.  For as long as I've known her, she's seemed to take joy in being a nuisance. Perhaps nuisance was the wrong word, but she was annoying and infuriating, and she enjoyed it. Why she only ever tormented me like that, I’ve never understood.

 _Do you have a problem with my company?_ Akumako’s question replayed in my head. It was obvious that her question was an attempt to bait me, and as always, I took it without even thinking. In irritation, I flung a random book at a wall and sat on my bed, still fuming. _Well, for starters, all you ever seem to do is find new things to irritate me with,_ I thought, inwardly responding to late to the redhead, _Then there’s the fact that I can’t seem to escape you. When we’re here, you always show up wherever I am. In the field, half the time, you get sent with me. And no matter what, you insist on being abrasive and irritating. Would it kill you to be pleasant like you are with other people? No! I don’t like being around people, but you could at least try to be tolerable! Just act nice for once, would you?_ I continued ranting in my head, venting my frustrations into the void. But of course, I couldn’t say any of this earlier, even though I wanted to, because, hothead that I am, I would almost definitely wind up saying some things that are best left unknown.

 

Akumako's POV

Through my entire meal, all of the finders that filed in sat as far away from me as possible. Over the years, I had gotten a reputation not unlike Kanda's, though not quite so volatile, and much more curse-related. Even so, not wanting to risk their safety - or having my ‘curse’ rub off on them - most people gave me a pretty wide berth, especially when Kanda was around. The two of us together was a fight waiting to happen. Other than the lovely Jerry, Lenalee and the Science Division were pretty much the only ones who talked to me frequently, and I often scared even them.

When I finished eating, I returned my massive stack of dishes to Jerry and left, thanking him. Having nothing better to do, I headed down to one of the training rooms, which, surprisingly, didn't have Kanda in it for once. I would’ve thought he’d gone straight here to blow off some steam after I made him storm out like that. The room I chose was filled with akuma dummies I could for practice.

I ditched my jacket on the ground and silently tried to activate my Innocence, but this time, the activation fizzled out. After three more failed attempts, I finally managed to keep my weapon activated for more than a few seconds. In my primary activation, I slashed through the nearest dummies with no problems, so I decided to bump it up a notch and practice with my secondary form. During my examination earlier, it wasn’t too difficult to keep it, but keeping activation in training is different than just sitting around. I swung the sharp blades at another akuma doll, but my cuts were awkward and shallow. Clearly, I was out of practice with this form. After a couple of hours of hacking dummies apart, my movements were much smoother and the gashes in the dolls were cleaner and deeper. I allowed myself a short break to catch my breath and let my muscles relax a bit, but before I could continue, the alarm went off. With my focus broken, my Innocence deactivated on its own. I clamped my hands down over my ears to try to smother the abhorrent noise, but I couldn't completely block it out.

As I was trained to do, I ran straight to Komui's office where I found Reever, Johnny, Tapp Dopp, Number 65, Lenalee, and of course, Komui. All of them were watching a golem feed from the front gate.

"Why did the alarm go off?" I asked, "Are we under attack?"

Komui turned around calmly and responded, "Oh, Akumako, you're here! Don't worry about it. Kanda's going out to take care of the intruder as we speak." I pushed Komui aside so I could see the screen. All I saw was a teenage boy, no more than two or three years younger than me, protesting to the gatekeeper that he wasn't an akuma. What caught my attention most of all was his bright white hair and the mark on the left side of his face. Was that a scar or something? A breeze blew a lock of the boy's hair aside, showing a pentacle on his forehead above his eyebrow.

"Komui, that kid isn't an akuma," I said blankly. Everyone looked at me quizzically.

Lenalee inquired, "Are you sure, Akumako? The gatekeeper scanned him and said-"

"He's not an akuma, Lenalee!" I snapped at her. She recoiled from me slightly, knowing that I could be as ill-tempered as Kanda. Speak of the devil, Kanda showed up on the screen and immediately started slashing at the newcomer with Mugen. If possible, he seemed even more vicious than usual. I half cringed, half laughed in my head, _Might be my fault. Sorry kid!_ The boy continuously ran around attempting to dodge Kanda's blade, but after several close calls, he activated a weapon embedded in his left arm to help him block without losing anything. Once I noticed that the kid's weapon was being damaged by Mugen, I decided that, rather than sit inside and watch him get shredded, I would go out and help the kid avoid such a horrible fate.

"Where are you going, Akumako?" Komui asked.

I responded sharply, "Apparently, to go piss Kanda off even more." At that, I ran out of the surveillance room and down a hall that led to a balcony. I looked down at Kanda trying to murder the white-haired boy. I leapt off the railing, thankful that I was only on the second floor. Before I hit the ground, I had my entire plan laid out in my head. 1) Stop Kanda from decapitating the kid. 2) Debilitate Kanda if necessary. 3) Get them both inside and let the Science Division take over. I landed with my arms transformed and before Kanda could land another hit, I jumped between him and his target, catching Mugen in my hand. I winced at the pain of the sharp blade cutting into my armoured hand. Blood the same shade of my hair seeped from the new wound.

"What do you think you're doing, Freak?!" Kanda yelled angrily. He applied more force behind Mugen, cutting me deeper and earning a groan of pain from me.

"I'm stopping this fight, idiot. This kid is clean! He's not an akuma!"

"Yeah right!"

"She's right! I'm not an akuma!" The boy wailed in fear, "Why don't you believe me? Master Cross sent a letter saying that I would be coming!"

A golem flew down next to us and spoke using Komui's voice, "That's true, actually. I just found the letter he was talking about. He's General Cross's student, so it was a false alarm!" The murderous intent in Kanda's eyes wavered briefly before turning his anger elsewhere.

"GATEKEEPER!"

The huge stone face cried indignantly, "What? It's not my fault! I was doing my job! I thought he was an akuma!" Even after over a decade, I had no clue how that thing worked.

"That's nice, Gatekeeper," I said sourly, "But it doesn’t matter, because he’s not. Now open the door and let us in."

It did so without further protest, revealing Lenalee in the entryway. "Hey! Come on in!" She said cheerfully. I released Mugen and Kanda put the thing away. Both of us seemed less than happy, but at least I had a reason for it. Kanda just had a stick up his ass, pardon my French. The white-haired boy, General Cross's student, happily followed Lenalee, probably thrilled to get away from the two pissed off, seemingly homicidal teenagers. True, sometimes I seemed pretty jovial, but other times, I could be just as cold and violent as Kanda. At least I actually _tried_ to be in a good mood most of the time.

I pushed past Kanda with plans of retreating to my room and maybe reading a book, but Lenalee easily stopped that dream from happening by promptly stopping me as soon as I tried to walk past her. She caught me by the collar and jerked me back, my significantly greater height resulting in my butt saying ‘hi’ to the floor. “And just where do you think you’re going?”

“Ow!” I snapped, "You could just say ‘stop,’ you know!"

"Because you’d actually listen for once?" she replied, all too familiar with my behaviour, "Sorry, but you’ve got to come see my brother before you can slink away and hide."

"AGAIN?!" I cried, "But I already saw him earlier today!"

"We all were watching, Akumako. Kanda split your hand open again."

"No, he didn't. I'm fine. Now let me go!" I protested.

Lenalee denied my freedom, "Akumako, there’s blood all over your arm. And it deactivated on its own again." I glanced at my hands, seeing that my Innocence had transformed back into my normal limbs.

"God dammit!" I sighed in exasperation, "I lose focus for one damn second, and my weapon shuts down! This stupid Innocence is gonna kill me someday." Lenalee started walking and chatting with the newcomer, leading the poor, clueless bastard to Komui's office, dragging me behind her. "HEY!" I shrieked, "I'm still here, Lenalee!"

She turned her head back and smiled all-too innocently. "I'm sorry, I'm being rude. I forgot to introduce you two!" She said happily, completely ignoring the fact that she was dragging me around like a sack of vegetables… A ferociously struggling sack of veggies, but beside the point.

The white-haired boy waved at me awkwardly, probably starting to wonder if everyone in the Black Order was insane. "My name is Allen Walker. It's nice to meet you!"

"I'm Akumako," I responded simply.

"Akumako what?" He inquired as to what my last name was.

I wasn’t surprised. Nearly everyone just assumes I had a surname like the rest of them, but that typically requires that you know who your family was. "It's just Akumako. I don't have a last name." The boy, Allen, seemed a little surprised.

"You don't have a last name?"

"Nope."

"Does your family not have a name, then?"

"Don’t have one."

Allen was a bit taken aback. "Don’t you ever get lonely?"

I looked away at the center of the tower, and thought about it for a moment. "Not really. There’s always people here, but I like my alone time. I never knew my parents, so being alone isn’t a big deal for me. Ma- OWOWOWOW!" My sentence was cut off when Lenalee dragged me down some stairs, the edges stabbing into my back. "You're doing even more damage to me than Kanda did, Lenalee! Quit it!" I yelled.

"Sorry."

"You're not sorry at all!"

"Anyway," she started talking again, completely ignoring me, "Once Komui has a look at your injuries, Allen, he'll take you down to Hevlaska for evaluation and I can show you around! Does that sound good?"

Allen replied politely, "Yeah, that sounds great, Miss Lenalee!"

Not-so-politely, I said, "You won’t be thinking it’s so great in a few minutes, Walker. Trust me."

I warned him.


	3. A Letter and a Mission

I took a little while for the new kid to get over the shock of Komui's terrifying Innocence repairs. He was unresponsive for a few minutes, but eventually we managed to get him on the elevator to take him to Hevlaska for evaluation. He panicked at first, which was actually pretty funny to watch, but Hevlaska quickly calmed him down and reassured him the she was no threat. Once she managed to examine his Innocence thoroughly, Hevlaska judged him to have an 83% synchro-rate. I was actually fairly impressed. For a newbie, that’s pretty good. The elevator whisked us back up to the level that Komui's office was at and we got off the contraption.

Komui waved at us, saying, "I’m heading back down to see what Hevlaska wanted to talk about earlier. See you later, my sweet Lenalee!" he yelled maniacally as he disappeared into the depths of the tower, completely ignoring Allen and me.

Lenalee grimaced a little and laughed uncomfortably. Moving on, she turned back to the new boy. "Sooo… Allen, shall I show you around? I can take you to your room and help you set up there, if you want."

"Sure! That sounds nice, Miss Lenalee," he replied.

"Just Lenalee, please." The two walked away, chatting like old friends. I took the opportunity to slip away and find something better to do, like read a book, eat, or see how long I could bother Kanda before he tries to kill me. In the end, I made the decision - that I knew I could potentially get in massive trouble for - to sneak back down to Hevlaska's level to see if I could overhear what she and Komui were discussing. There wasn’t much else for me to be doing, and you can’t go and mention a secret-sounding meeting around me without me trying to figure out what it’s about. It’s a bad habit at best, but one never knows when sneaking around and espionage might come in handy in my profession. I knew very well that it was highly plausible that I’d get in trouble for my snooping, but as I often tell myself, nothing is against the rules if you don't get caught!

As I got closer to Komui and Hevlaska, their conversation became more and more audible. Whatever they were talking about, it sounded serious. I could hear the gravity in their voices, low and almost worried.

"…I’m sure you see it too, Komui… It is only short time before other people start to notice as well, many of whom could be a serious threat," I heard Hevlaska say, "This one is the only one of their kind to have been given the chance to choose their own fate… If they are consumed by their true nature, then you will have no choice-"

"I know, Hevlaska," Komui cut her off, apparently knowing what the giant Exorcist would say, "I assigned Kanda to kill them if it comes to that. He's the most suited to the task. Have no fear, Hevlaska. As much as I don’t like it, I’ve thought this through plenty," he reassured her.

"Good. Just be warned; Demon Exorcists are supposed to be commanded by the Millennium Earl. If you don't keep a very close watch, he may reclaim what was once his."

"I doubt it will be an issue. A - Ahem - The Demon Exorcist has adapted well over the years, and seems to feel at home here. They’re completely unaware that they’re any different from their peers. There’s nothing suggesting that the enemy has any sway over them at all." I found it strange that Komui and Hevlaska were only referring to this 'Demon Exorcist' as 'They' rather than he or she. Didn't they have a name, or were they just some unimportant test subject?

"Be that as it may, I'm still concerned, Komui. If you are wrong, you do understand the consequences, do you not?"

Komui nodded grimly, "Of course I do. By putting my faith in the Demon Exorcist, I put the Order at risk. If they turn unexpectedly, the damage could be catastrophic. But from my experience with our Demon Exorcist, I sincerely believe there’s nothing to worry about."

Sensing that it was time to leave, I silently crept away, confused, as Hevlaska cryptically muttered, "I pray that you are right, Komui. I truly do."

* * *

 

For several days, I mulled over what I heard. All of my time was spent in the cafeteria and the library, and even when I was eating, I had my nose in a book, trying to find any reference to the Demon Exorcist. Despite my efforts, I couldn’t find anything. Not so much as a whisper or theory. I needed to know what this thing was, and it was driving me up the wall. It was completely consuming my thoughts. Even my bizarre dreams had been put on hold so I could read in my sleep, rereading what I’d read that day, but to no avail.

I’d been so focused on the Demon Exorcist, I’d been ignoring pretty much everyone. Most people didn’t seem to notice or care, other than the Science Division, who always wanted me to come help them, and shockingly enough, Kanda. When I hadn’t pestered him like I usually do, he seemed confused and almost irritated, like it actually bothered him that I wasn’t paying him any attention. If I was actually trying to get a response of some kind from him, I would have been delighted, especially since I actually kind of enjoyed being around him this way, when he wasn’t trying to kill me, but that wasn’t the case. I was just to in my own head to the moment to really acknowledge him. 

It was quiet in the cafeteria. There wasn’t really anyone there since it was pretty late. I crouched over a book in the corner, nibbling on my last bowl of mushrooms. I glanced up briefly when I heard the loud clap of a tray smacked down onto the table, then turned my eyes back to my book when I saw that my most irritable coworker had decided to sit with me.

He sat down and stared at me for a bit, not even touching his soba, before finally snapping, “You can’t even be polite and say ‘hello’?”

I didn’t bother looking up, “Well, when I talk to you at all, you usually get pissy or try to stab me.”  

“Only because you’re infuriating.”

“I doubt that would hold up in court.”

Kanda glared at me and slowly started eating his noodles. “What are you doing?” he asked abruptly.

“Reading,” I replied simply.

“That’s not what I mean.”

“Then say what you mean, genius.”

Kanda’s glare deepened. “ _ Fine _ . What I meant was ‘why have you been acting like an unsociable recluse?’”

“I am un unsociable recluse.”

“No you’re not, you’re just a woman who likes books and being a pest.”

“Potatoes, potahtoes.” 

Kanda pinched the bridge of his nose, frustrate that I wouldn’t directly answer him, but at least he wasn’t threatening me this time. “I’m going to try this again.” He glanced up and grabbed my book from me.

“Hey!” I tried to grab it back from him, but he held it far out of my reach.

“You’re not acting like yourself. Why?”

“I’ve just been busy. Now give it back!”

“Being ‘busy’ has never changed how you acted before,” he pointed out.

“I’ve just been really dedicated to this. Sorry I haven’t been obnoxious enough for your tastes, but this has been nagging me for days, and now you’re getting in my way. So gimme my damn book back!” For a second, it looked like he was going to keep questioning me with his literary hostage, but instead, he gave it back. I snatched it from his hand and quickly scanned the paper to check for tears. Luckily, there weren’t any, so I could relax a bit. “Since when did you care, anyway?”

Kanda froze and glanced to the side, seemingly unsure of what to say. “It was just disconcerting, I guess,” he finally said, “I mean, last time you started acting particularly weird, you almost died.”

“Oh, that’s right.” I thought back, remembering when I was fourteen and came down with a sudden fever that left me unconscious for over a week. Part of that may have been from passing out and tumbling down the stairs though. In any case, like Kanda said, I did come pretty close to dying. They never did figure out what exactly was causing the fever, but it eventually resolved itself and I woke up. “I’d forgotten about that. I didn’t realize you cared that much though.”

“Yeah, well…” Kanda cut himself off and changed the subject, “So what’s so important that you’ve been researching it into oblivion?”

I laughed at myself in my head, having let myself get distracted from my task. I never would’ve thought that talking with Kanda would pull me away from something I was so dedicated to. Hell, I never thought we’d ever have a civil conversation. It was actually a nice change. “I’ve been trying to find information on this thing I heard about, but I haven’t found anything at all. It’s almost like it doesn’t exist at all.”

“What is it though?”

“It’s called a ‘Demon Exorcist,’ I told him, “Sounds pretty freaky, right?” I didn’t miss the way Kanda’s back went rigid when I mentioned the Demon Exorcist or how his dark eyes widened in surprise. “Ever heard of it?”

He regained his composure as quickly as he’d lost it and coolly denied, “Can’t say that I have.”

As soon as he said that, I recalled the conversation I overheard, and Komui bringing up Kanda. “Bullshit. I know you know at least something. Now, what do you know about Demon Exorcists?" I demanded. 

He replied curtly, "What do  _ you _ know about Demon Exorcists? You shouldn't even know they exist, Redhead."

"So you do know something about them?"

"Only because Komui decided that he wanted me to kill one if it turned on us." Kanda's eyes narrowed even further. "If you think I'm telling you anything at all, you're sorely mistaken. It's confidential. How did you even find out them?"

"Well…" I knew I couldn't get out of answering, and anything I said would incriminate me, so I figured I might as well confess. "I heard Komui talking about a Demon Exorcist with Hevlaska. All I got out of it was that the Order has one, and they're dangerous. And that you were supposed to kill them if they turned against us, right?"

"You're too nosy for your own good."

“Yes, I know.”

Kanda grit his teeth and made a small noise, then told me, “Look, you might as well quit the research. You’re not gonna find anything in any of the books in the library. And while you’re at it, never mention it again. To anyone, got it?”

“But-”

“ _ Never again, _ ” he repeated sternly, “Nobody is supposed to know that Demon Exorcists exist. If anyone found out that you knew anything, even just the name…” He trailed off, the harshness in his voice evaporating and something foreign taking hold in his eyes.

“Kanda?”

“Look, it would be bad. So just shut up about it and keep it to yourself, alright?”

“Alright, alright! Fine!” I conceded. Even if we didn’t get along well, I knew better than to ignore a warning like this from Kanda. This wasn’t about hiding information from me. His voice and that look in his eye assured me of that.

He was worried.

* * *

 

After eating, I returned my book to the library and went back to my room.  _ What could possibly be so bad that  _ Kanda _ worries about it? _ I thought as I opened my door. I just couldn’t wrap my head around it.  _ I mean, he  _ is _ human, so he’s got to have feelings in there somewhere, but I’ve never seen Kanda worry about something before. It’s a bit unsettling, actually. _ A sharp tapping sound snapped me out of my thoughts. Being several floors up, I had a pretty good idea of what it was. I walked over to my window and pulled the curtain aside. Sure enough, there was my little red golem, Akai. I let it inside and it flew in quickly to perch on my desk. Akai opened its mouth and spat a folded-up letter out onto the desk.  _ Thank god golems don't have saliva. _

I licked up the letter and ripped the seal open. As I expected, it was from General Cross, my mentor. As far as I knew, I was the only one with any regular contact with him, and he made it very clear that I wasn’t to let anyone know about it. His location was unknown, and that was how he liked it.  _ Isn’t the new kid one of General Cross’s students too? _ I thought,  _ I think that’s what he said. I wonder if he has contact with him too… Probably not. _ I shrugged that off and got back to reading.

 

_ Dear Akumako, _

_ If he hasn't shown up yet, I've sent another apprentice to the Order to become an official Exorcist. Naturally, there's no way in Hell that I'd go back there, so I won't get to see how much you’ve grown. How many years has it been since I last saw you? Four years? Anyway, the kid's got enough of a brain to make it to headquarters alive… I think. _

_ How has your Innocence been? You've mentioned before that it's been acting up and been difficult to use sometime. Has it improved at all? Have you gotten Hevlaska to take a look at it? She might be able to help. I wouldn't recommend going to Komui, though. The guy’s insane, so don't strain yourself while training. You would not want to be forced to have that nutjob fix your arms… or have worse things happen… _

_ On another note, do you have a boyfriend yet? If you do, he'd better treat you right, or I swear I will kill him. If he does anything, let me know, and I’ll hunt the bastard to the ends of the earth! God, I sound like an overprotective father, don't I? Sorry. I still find myself thinking of the scared little kid you were when I found you. You were so small, and you actually needed me back then. I guess I get a little carried away when it comes to keeping my favorite apprentice safe. Maybe we can have a good chat one day if we run into each other out in the world, but for now, letters will have to do. _

_ Sincerely, General Marian Cross _

 

Anyone else who read the letters my master sent would've thought that they were out-of-character for him, but he was always like that with me. Around other people, General Cross was a crude, drunken womanizer who didn't care about anyone except himself, but around me, he was always gentle and kind. I didn't really remember much about our couple of years together, since I was only four when he found me, but my first clear memory is of the General holding his hand out to me in a dark, broken house and telling me that everything was going to be alright from then on. According to what I was told later, my family and I had been attacked by a group of akuma and General Cross destroyed them and took me away from there. He taught me how to use my Innocence, along with pretty much everything else I know. I owe him everything. If it wasn't for General Cross, I'd be dead. He was the closest thing to a father I had.

Interrupting my train of thought, there was a loud knock on my door. I stashed General Cross's letter under some papers on my desk before opening the door. For some reason, Komui was standing outside. Then I noticed the manila folder tucked under his arm. Oh. Work

"Can I come in, Akumako?" he asked politely. "I have a job for you."

"Yeah, sure." I let him in and sat on my bed, trying to act nonchalant, but internally happy that I would finally get to get out of this blasted tower.

Komui handed me the file and I read through the contents. Once I processed the job description, I stared at the maniac incredulously. “Are you trying to get me killed?”

Lenalee's obsessive brother shook his hands back and forth rapidly, denying it entirely. "Don't be so melodramatic! I just want you to keep an eye on Kanda and Allen to make sure that he doesn't die, that's all!"

"Which one are you talking about?"

"Well, mostly Allen, but try to make sure Kanda doesn't die either," he responded.

"The new kid?"

Komui sighed, "Yes, that's him. The boy with white hair."

I thought for a moment, and then said, "And you're sending him on his first mission with  _ Kanda _ ? Do you want me  _ and _ the Moyashi to die?!"

"Ugh…" Komui buried his face in his palm, "Why do you and Kanda call him the same thing?"

"Probably because we’re both Japanese, genius." Some people didn’t believe it because of my red hair and blue eyes, but it was true. “Anyway, why exactly do you want me to go with them? It looks like a pretty in-and-out thing. Do you even need two Exorcists?”

“It’s better safe than sorry. And like I said, you’re there to keep an eye on them, not to collect Innocence.”

“I don’t think they need a babysitter, Komui. And I don’t need to give Kanda another reason to stab me. You know he hates going on missions with me.”

"Then I guess it’s a good thing they shouldn’t even know you’re there unless they’re in immediate danger, isn’t it?"

“Oh no,” I groaned, “You’re sending me out as an  _ undercover _ babysitter?” There was nothing worse than a pointless task, other than a  _ boring _ pointless task.

“That’s right! Have fun!”

And so I found myself on a train a few hours later wearing a cloak and sitting with a man I had never met, just praying that something interesting would happen.


	4. Reddened Eyes

Within an hour or so of the train pulling out from the station, I found my open eye starting to slip closed. From experience, I knew that attempting to resist falling asleep was futile, so I allowed my eye to slide shut and share the darkness of my right side. My long red hair pressed against the window as a slight cushion from the cool glass. In the brief moments before I drifted off into the abyss of unconsciousness, a large, warm hand pressed lightly down on my shoulder and a light weight settled over me. It felt familiar and, somehow... Safe.

For the first time in years, I didn't dream. The absence of strange voices and images was pleasant and allowed me to wake up peacefully for once. My left eye flickered open drowsily to see a man sitting across from me. He was the same person who had been there since I had boarded, but only now did I actually notice him. He was tall and strong-looking, with a handsome, relaxed face as he watched the landscape roll past the window. Judging by his fine clothes and the tall hat that sat beside him, the stranger was probably a young nobleman. _T_ _ his guy probably has women falling at his feet left and right, _ I thought as I sat up, knocking off the object that had been covering me.

The stranger's gaze shifted from the horizon to me and he smiled, "Ah, you're finally awake. That's good." My fingers found themselves tangled in the fabric of the thing that had covered me while I slept, which turned out to be this man's coat. I brushed it off and handed it to him shyly, as I tend to be around strangers.

"I assume you'll be wanting this back, sir?" I said politely, if not a little bit awkwardly.

He took the expensive-looking garment with a slight chuckle, "Yes, thank you, miss. And there's no need to be so formal. My name is Tyki Mikk. You may call me Tyki if you wish." Tyki smiled again, more amicably this time. "Might I have the honor of knowing your name, my dear?"

I felt blood rush to my cheeks at Tyki's casual flirting. "Oh, yes, of course! My name is Akumako."

"Ah," he sighed, looking off into nothingness, "What a lovely name. It's Japanese, isn’t it?" I nodded, curious as to why he didn't ask about my surname like most people did. "Do you know what your name means? I'm curious."

I stiffened when he asked me that. I knew very well what it meant, and I didn't like sharing it with others. When we were kids, Kanda made sure that I knew how horrible my name’s meaning was. "It means 'Demon Child,'" I said quickly, hoping Tyki couldn't hear me.

"How unusual. I like that," he complimented unexpectedly.

"You like it? I've only ever been told that my parents must have hated me to call me a demon."

"That's nonsense," Tyki denied, "Anyone who tells you that simply can't understand and appreciate the beauty of unique things. Such a unique name befits an exotic young lady such as yourself." You know how I said earlier that Tyki  _ 'probably has women falling at his feet' _ ? Well, scratch that. He  _ definitely _ has ladies begging to sell off their hands in marriage to him. He reserved no compliments and seemed to be a bit of a playboy. Still, I rather liked Tyki. Talking to him was easy and felt familiar, even though I had only known him for a few minutes. Well, first impressions are important, and he made a good one.

We chatted amicably for a while longer until the train's wheels screeched around a bend and the locomotive began to slow down. The train pulled into the next station, which I recognized by the sign as the place I was supposed to get off at. I caught a glimpse of Kanda's long, blueish-black hair as he exited the train.

"Sorry, Tyki, but this is my stop. I need to leave before the train takes off again," I said regrettably as I stood up and headed towards the door of the car, "It was nice meeting you!"

Just before I got out of earshot, I could swear Tyki said, "Yes, it was wonderful seeing you too, Akumako."

I ran behind the Exorcists I was tailing, staying around a quarter mile behind so that I could still see them but they wouldn't notice my presence. Fortunately, it wasn't hard to keep an eye on Allen and Kanda, seeing as there was very little in this desert to block my line of sight except the occasional rock or spindly bush. That's all I was grateful for, though. Even at night, this place was too warm and dry for my liking. I could scarcely imagine how bad it was during the day.

Shortly after the boys entered the ghost city of Mater, explosions rang through the night, lighting up the ruins like fireworks and signalling that the battle between Exorcists and akuma had begun. Within a few minutes, I too reached Mater, weaving my way through the various alleys and streets to avoid detection and get to the scene of the fight. My right eye began to itch as it always did when akuma were nearby. I started to get excited, but I repeatedly had to remind myself that I wasn't allowed to fight unless Allen or Kanda was in danger, although I figured that they could take care of themselves. 

A bit lost in the unfamiliar twists and turns of Mater’s crumbling streets, I almost barged right into the battle without realizing it. I quickly ducked behind a convenient stack of crates that allowed me both concealment and a great view of what was happening. Allen seemed to be holding his own, but Kanda was nowhere to be fine.  _ Whatever, _ I told myself,  _ He's fine _ . It was the new beansprout I was supposed to be watching anyway. Overall, he was pretty good. His technique was a little sloppy, but he would improve over time. His weapon actually reminded me of a rougher version of my own, and his only covered a single arm.  _ Maybe I should give him some pointers when we get back. _

As I critiqued Allen's fighting, something large crept up out of the corner of my eye. I shifted my head and saw an akuma sneaking up on the white-haired boy. He was completely absorbed in the monster he was fighting now. There was no way he would notice this one in time. It was already aiming its guns at his back. I ran out from behind the crates at full speed, leaping at the short kid and catching his shoulder with my foot, yelling, "Stupid beansprout!" A flash of of pain erupted and my vision went red. Was my hair in my eyes? No. This was just the same exact color as the shiny keratin strands atop my head.

It was blood.

 

Allen's POV

Something heavy slammed into my shoulder and knocked me to the sandy ground. As I fell, a large mass of red and black also collapsed, but I couldn't tell what it was in the darkness of night. A small black object fluttered down next to my face.  _ What's this? _ I thought as I picked it up,  _ An eye patch? _ A breeze turned it so that the silver cross adorning it flashed in the moonlight.  _ This belongs to that red-haired girl from HQ, Akumako!  _ Within a few seconds, the red-and-black mass I had seen fall began thrashing in the sand and screaming obscenities into the sky.

"Agh! Damn it! I can't see!" Well, what'dya know? It was Akumako. There was blood all over her face, but at first it looked like her hair. "Ow! You stupid akuma! If you're gonna shoot me, at least do it properly! And you!" She pointed accusingly, "This is your fault! If you'd been paying attention like a half-decent Exorcist, I wouldn't have had to get shot to save your ass! What do you have to say for yourself?!"

"Um... You realize I'm over here, right?" In her blindness, she'd been pointing in the completely opposite direction.

"Goddammit..."

 

Akumako's POV

Not having your eyesight when there are akuma everywhere is generally not a good thing. From what I could tell, my eye patch was missing, but my eyes themselves were fine... I think. It felt like little more than a graze - a deep, painful one. I was making a fuss, but I would be fine. I’d take care of it later, provided I didn’t get shot to death first. Fortunately, I had learned how to fight by using my ears as well as my eyes, so I figured I could manage. Plus, if I got hit a few times (as long as they weren't vital spots) I would most likely survive. Thank god that Parasitic types like me can purge the Akuma virus.

I heard the distinctive 'ca-chak' of the akuma around Allen and I re-aiming their guns at us. "Move!" I yelled, somersaulting away and running, arms slightly extended so that I wouldn't run into a wall. I learned to do that from experience. Kanda held that over my head for months.

"There's a pile of rocks on your right!" Allen shouted to me, acting as a sort of seeing-eye-dog. How humiliating. I'd just have to deal with it until I could clear the stream of blood cascading into my eyes. "Jump!" I followed the Moyashi's instruction but my foot still caught on whatever I was jumping over. I think it may have been an old crate, like the ones I hid behind earlier.

I crashed into the sand, unable to see or figure out which way I needed to go. My ears picked up the ominous sound of the akuma chasing its prey. I laughed at myself. Did I condemn myself to death by saving Allen Walker, a boy I had scarcely met? Maybe. What a pitiful way to go. At least I wouldn't die for nothing.

"Mugen, summon misfortune, Netherworld Creatures, first illusion!" The approaching monster exploded, pelting me with fragments of its mechanical body.

I whipped my head around in vain. "Kanda?! Is that you?" A strong hand pulled me up with more force than necessary. Yup. That was Kanda, alright.

"Who else would it be, Redhead?"

"I can't see, so I don't know, moron!" I defended irritably.

"Che," Kanda let out his standard sound of annoyance, "What the hell are you doing here, anyway? Did Komui get you to follow me again?"

"Moyashi, actually, wherever he went," I replied. I could feel the other Exorcist glaring at me.

"So you're basically that pipsqueak's bodyguard?"

"That’s one word you could use." Where was he going with this? Without warning, my feet left the ground and my stomach landed painfully on top of Kanda's shoulder. "Ack! The hell?!"

"We're hiding. I need to take a quick breather and you need to get cleaned up, otherwise you'll remain completely useless," Kanda said. He started running, repeatedly knocking the wind out of my lungs and disabling my ability to talk back. After several minutes and plenty of turns, Kanda set me down inside one of the run-down houses, judging by the level of red light filtering through my eyelids. He didn't speak, but I heard him slump down into the sand, breathing heavily. Normally he wouldn't show any sign of weakness around anyone, but maybe he didn’t make a fuss about it since I couldn’t actually see him. I heard the sound of water sloshing in a container as Kanda gulped some of it down. I jumped a bit when he suddenly snapped, "Do you have any bandages or something?"

"What?" I said dumbly.

"Bandages, idiot! You know, fabric to wrap wounds in? Some kind of cloth?"

I tapped the areas across my torso that held my pockets. "Yeah, I think I have bandages here somewhere..." I started searching the pouch I kept at my hip, feeling around for the wrappings I carried with me. The fabric brushed my fingertips and I grabbed it and pulled it out, holding the white linen out in the direction I assumed Kanda was in. "Here you go. I'm not sure where you are, so you'll have to get it yourself." He did so without complaining and I expected him to be dressing his own injuries, assuming he had any. Instead, I felt the fabric I had handed to him wipe gently over my eyes, soaked with cool water. "Wha-?"

"Don't start feeling special or anything. I just can’t tote you around with akuma around if you can’t see, got it?"

"Yeah. I got it," I assured him. In truth, my heart was pounding for some reason. I decided it just must have simply been surprise, or maybe it was the adrenaline rush from earlier, and I was only just now noticing.

He finished cleaning the half-dried blood from my eyelids and said, "Try opening your eyes, Redhead." I did as he said. My eyes stung and my vision was tinted red, but I could see nonetheless. It was actually a little strange to watch the young man I normally argued with so much simply clean my injury, minor though it was, without even a trace of hostility. It was, for lack of a better word, weird.

 

Kanda's POV

The Redhead's blood had stained the whites of her eyes light red and discoloured the blue irises. Fortunately for her, the bullet had only grazed her forehead. She’d likely be left with a bit of a scar, but scars come with the territory. It would just be another reminder of a job she'd done. With every trace of blood that I wiped away, the wound looked less and less serious. When the rest of the blood was gone, I tore the wet fabric from the end of the roll and wrapped the dry part around her head to protect the injury from further harm. I tried my best to keep my usual stoic appearance as I looked into the Redhead's freakish eyes again. "I'm done. Do what you want."

She thought for a moment, deciding what she felt would be the best course of action for her. "Can I stick with you, Kanda?" she asked with a tone that got my own blood burning, "It would be easier for us to keep track of one another and to make sure neither of us gets killed, you know?"

"Fine," I agreed, "But if you get in my way, I'll kill you just like I'd kill any other akuma, understand?"

"Same to you, Kanda."

 

Akumako's POV

Kanda allowed me to tag along with him without fighting me too much about it, which I was thankful for. I wasn't in the mood to bicker with him. Of course, I just thought sticking together would be safer and more practical. That’s all. There wasn’t much point in splitting up again at that point, and my vision was still blurry from all the blood. I imagine my eyes looked pretty freaky, since they were probably stained red. My right eye must have been downright disturbing. It was bizarre enough on its own. That’s why I kept it hidden under my eyepatch for so long. 

_ Kanda’s not making a fuss about it at all, _ I realized,  _ When we were younger, he wouldn’t shut up about it. _ I had always assumed that no matter how old we got, Kanda would never let it go. Maybe he was finally mature enough to overlook the black pentacle in my eye that I’d hidden for him for so many years.


	5. Demon Eye

I had never enjoyed hiding out in old buildings, let alone new ones, and I knew Kanda didn't either, yet we found ourselves ducking into another one of Mater's crumbling houses. Unfortunately, one of the akuma in the area had evolved to level 2, making my - or rather,  _ our _ \- job a lot harder. Level 1 akuma are all the same, but once they evolve, it's impossible to tell what powers they'll have. I think just about every Exorcist that ever lived can agree that evolved akuma are pains in the ass, pardon my French. Now, Kanda and I were stuck hiding out in a building that looked like it would collapse on us at any second. It would be pretty pathetic if we were killed by a house.

I couldn't shake the feeling that we weren't alone. Obviously, there was Allen, Toma, and the akuma out there in the city somewhere, as well as the Ghost of Mater, but there was someone other than Kanda and I in this very building. I could feel it. If only my eyes weren't still messed up from all the blood I got in them earlier, I could find every human in the entire city in a heartbeat. Much to my chagrin, my vision was still red, so I couldn't see the different colors of humans, akuma and Innocence, which is the only good thing about the pentacle in my eye. So, instead of using my "demon eye", as Kanda called it, I settled for wandering through every room and checking every cranny for signs of life. I didn't find anything until I came to an old wooden door. The door itself meant nothing until I tried to open it, only to find that it was locked. In the silence, I heard hushed whispers and shuffling from the other side. Grinning widely, I whispered, "I found you..."

"What was that, Redhead?" Kanda snapped.

"I'm not talking to you," I replied as I took a few steps back. I launched myself at the door. "Come out, come out, Ghost of Mater!" Sure enough, behind the shattered door in a dark, barren room huddled what looked like an old man and a lovely young girl. "I found you," I repeated. I frowned when they both cowered away from me.

"Who are you?" The girl asked, clearly afraid of me, "What do you want with us?"

"It's not  _ you _ we're after," I replied, "Don't go feeling so important."

"Don't go busting doors down, idiot!" Kanda scolded in his usual condescending manner, "Are you _trying_ to tell that damned akuma where we are?!" Only then did he notice the two people in front of me. "Who are they?"

I glared at him, snapping, "I would know if you would give enough damned time to ask!" Turning back to the frightened pair, I asked more forcefully than necessary, "So, who are you? I would say the Ghost of Mater, but there's two of you. So which is it?"

"I'm-" The young girl was cut off by her older companion.

"I am the Ghost of Mater. My name is Guzol."

Before I could respond, Kanda interjected, "Sorry old man, but you're no ghost." When I met his eyes, he looked almost smug.  _ Don't feel special, Pretty Boy. _ "What are you?"

"You're right. I am not a ghost. I am a doll..."

Before I knew it, we were being told his life story. After ten minutes or so, I was having a nice little conversation with my nonexistent friends and Kanda was starting to look very,  _ very  _ annoyed. Of course, everything annoys him, but that’s beside the point. He managed to escape when he got a call from Toma on his golem, but I was stuck listening to the old man ramble on and on about his past. When I actually tuned in, something sounded off. This old man's story didn't sit right. I had the nagging feeling that he was lying, or at least not telling the whole truth. Then, I realized; If this guy wasn't a human or an akuma, he wouldn't have a soul. If he was a doll like he claimed, he'd more likely have that greenish-white glow of Innocence, if anything. I would be able to see that. The issue was, my eyes were still stained. The crimson aura of a human, the violet akuma soul, and the glow of Innocence were invisible to me now. Then, I had an idea:

I pulled my small waterskin from the belt at my hip and tried putting a few drops of water in my left eye. I blinked a few times, and my vision on that side cleared. I repeated the process with my right eye, the redness washing away and my sight turning back to normal. It was such an obvious fix that I honestly could have smacked myself. Upon activation, every color I normally saw faded to shades of black and grey. I glanced at Kanda, who was now glowing crimson. Perfect. As for the so-called Ghost of Mater…

They were gone.

While I focused on rinsing my eyes and Kanda was talking to Toma, the two had escaped with the Innocence! "Where did they go?!" I growled to myself. Kanda had stepped out and couldn't hear me from the other room, otherwise he probably would have snapped something back at me. I looked around, trying to locate the colors that would show me where they had gone. Through the wall, I could see faint, distant red signatures that were probably Allen and Toma. In the same area was a violet signature that was the level 2, showing that Allen hadn't killed it yet. "Where, oh, where is the Ghost of Mater?" I muttered bitterly. I looked at the ground, hoping to see footprints in the dust, but instead, I found two more colors: One red and done the greenish-white I had predicted. But why were they underground? On my knees, I pushed on the dust-and-sand covered bricks until I found a section the moved when I touched it. I pulled them up, revealing an underground passageway. All of the bricks were connected to form a sort of lid, probably to keep them from falling in. Without alerting my partner, I jumped into the blackness, not fully realizing how far away the ground was. I stumbled from the impact of my feet hitting the ground as the bricks fell back over the opening, leaving no light at all.

"Well," I mumbled, "I guess I'm not getting out that way." I scuffled around in the dirt until I found the wall to guide myself while I tried to follow the souls of the Ghost and their companion. I was more difficult than I had expected. Several times, I hit dead ends or tripped over rocks. After what must have been hours, I dropped into the dirt, tired of hunting those two down. "I'm done!" I shouted into the darkness, "I'm sick of chasing down an old man and a little girl! Let that akuma take it! I'll just hunt that down later!" The lack of a response was pretty underwhelming. "At least, if I ever find my way out of here." To entertain myself in the darkness, I hummed a lullaby, singing the words in my head.

 

_ "Two little boys had two little toys. _

_ Each had a wooden horse. _

_ Gaily they played each summer's day, _

_ They were warriors both, of course. _

_ Then one little chap, he had a mishap. _

_ He broke off his horse's head. _

_ He wept for his toy, then he _

_ cried for joy as his young playmate said, _

_ 'Did you think I would leave you crying _

_ when there's room on my horse for two? _

_ So climb up here Joe, and off we'll go. _

_ We can go just as fast with two. _

_ When we grow up, we'll both be soldiers, _

_ and our horses will not be toys. _

_ Do you think that we will remember _

_ when we were two little boys?'" _

 

The rest of the song drifted out of my head before I could finish, which upset me a little, but more importantly, where had I heard that song? I certainly hadn't learned it from General Cross, or anyone else from the Order for that matter. So who sang it to me?

A different melody soon reached my ears, this one’s mournful melody echoing through the tunnels instead of inside my own head. I followed the song, knowing exactly who was singing it. Chances are, anyone else who could hear the lullaby would reach the same conclusion, so I rushed to get there first. Before I could get there, however, the sorrowful tune was replaced by shrieks and crashes, then silence. The ground in front of me started to get brighter and there was light at the end of the tunnel. No, hadn’t died. However, after another crash, it appeared that the girl I had been following had and her elderly companion was on the verge of joining her. One glance told me that I had been right that he was lying earlier. He was the one emitting the red glow. 

Once I arrived in the huge cavern, I saw what I had missed: The level 2 had killed the doll and gotten a hold of the Innocence we were here for, and was battling the new kid, Allen. Kanda was lying in the sand alongside Toma the finder. Good job Kanda. At least he was trying to get up and not being pathetic, even though he looked pretty beat-up. I sprinted over to him, trying to avoid flying debris and stray shots from the battle going on just a few meters away.

Without missing a beat, I half-joked, "I didn't miss anything important, did I?" At first, Kanda just glared at me as if he were trying to make me catch fire or something. 

"Thanks for ditching me, Redhead," he growled bitterly.

"I'll take that as a 'no,'" I replied, "I'm guessing you don't want me to give you a hand, then?"

"Che. I don't need your help, Redhead!"

"Suit yourself." Without further ado, I commanded my weapon to activate and lunged for the akuma, slashing at it with my slender armored claws. I got several hits in, but there was a sudden jolt of unbearable pain in my right arm. I screamed in agony and collapsed, clutching my arm. The feeling was all too familiar, though it had never been so excruciating. My weapon was malfunctioning again, and this time in spectacular fashion. The entire arm was horrifically deformed, twisted and bent beyond recognition, appallingly disfigured discoloured. My arm twitched and pulsed painfully, turning grey with each passing second. I tried to keep fighting, but the pain was distorting my vision and making my attacks slow, sloppy, and weak.

Screaming and crying in pain, I went in for another attack, but was grabbed and pulled away from the fight. "Moron! Are you trying to get yourself killed?!" Kanda shouted at me as he dragged me back to the sidelines, in spite the fact that he was already injured, “You can’t fight like this!” I figured I was getting delirious, since I’d never heard such concern from Kanda in my life.

He pulled me as far from the fight as possible while Allen continued battling the akuma. Kanda dropped me into the dirt, and I could hear him telling me to pull myself together and get my weapon under control, but his voice was drowned out in my mind by the pain and awful grating sound coming from my arm as it writhed. All of the effort I put into trying to control the Innocence only seemed to make matters worse, and the distortion had begun spreading to my other arm.  _ Why now? Why is this happening now?! _ I couldn’t understand what was happening anymore. Why wouldn’t the Innocence cooperate with me? Why couldn’t I control it? Whenever I’d had problems during practice, I could deactivate and it would stop, but my weapon was completely rebelling this time and utterly ignoring my commands to shut down. It felt like the Innocence was trying to kill me. As I fought it, it drained more and more of my energy until I couldn’t continue anymore, and the last thing I heard was my name.

_ “Akumako!” _

* * *

 

I woke up on the floor of another crumbling building. I bolted up, surprised that my weapon hadn’t killed me after all. I looked down at my hands, smooth, ordinary flesh as if nothing had happened.  _ It must’ve deactivated on its own, _ I thought, grateful and bitter,  _ Good thing it didn’t  _ actually _ kill me. _ I tried standing but almost immediately was hit with a sickening feeling of spinning. The wall offered some support, but I was hesitant to put all of my weight on it in case it collapsed. Succumbing to my lightheadedness, I knelt back down into the dirt. One of my knees landed on my makeshift pillow, a folded-up coat. I knew it wasn't mine, since I was wearing it, and it wasn't Toma's, because this coat was black, so whose was it? The answer to my question walked in in the form of Kanda, looking angry as usual, but lacking any clothing above the waist.

"What're you looking at, Redhead?" Kanda snapped when he noticed me. I hadn't realized I'd been staring, but who could blame me? It was rare enough to see him without his coat, let alone with his entire torso bare. Anyone would look.

"Nothing," I said quickly and looked away. I picked up Kanda's folded-up coat and passed it to him. "I take it this is yours?"

"Yeah. Thanks." Did Kanda just say 'Thanks'? To me? My surprise clearly showed, and it obviously amused him. "What? I can't say 'thanks' when somebody gives me something?"

"Who are you, and what have you done with Kanda?" He snickered a bit, but not in in his typical condescending way. For once, he just sounded amused.

"Don’t worry, it’s me. Anyway, make sure you have everything. We're heading out shortly." So he’d already reported to HQ.

“Time to go home to Komui and his tools,” I groaned, “Joy.”

“No,” Kanda corrected, “Only Moyashi is going back. You’re coming with me straight to another mission.”

I squinted at Kanda quizzically. “Komui didn’t order me straight home?”

He shook his head, “Nope.”

“He didn’t want to inspect my weapon?”

"He probably would’ve it I told him what happened."

“You didn’t tell him?” I could scarcely believe it. Even I wouldn’t leave such an important detail out of a report. 

“Well, I did mention that you had a malfunction, but you resolved it. After that, he said to take you with me. You need to be careful with it and keep an eye on it, but apparently you don’t need to go home unless it acts up again.”

I wasn’t quite sure what to think, or even what to say. “Thank you,” I eventually said, “But why did you lie?”

He looked away from me, hiding an expression I couldn’t quite place. “Reasons,” he muttered, unwilling to elaborate.

"Fine,” I changed the subject, “Where're we headed?"

"Ireland, apparently. There's a small town called Newcastle that has reported strange activity. We don't have any other leads right now, so they're sending us to check it out. We’re supposed to meet up with Lavi on he way."

"Sounds good. When will we leave?"

"Daybreak.”

I nodded, thinking I was finished, but a whine from my stomach prompted me to ask, "By the way, how long was I out?

Kanda thought for a second before replying, then said, "About three days."

"THREE DAYS?!" No wonder I was so hungry...


	6. Road Trip

Kanda's POV

The trip from Mater to Ireland would be stressful, if we were to get there in a timely manner. The Redhead and I could only get about 3 hours of sleep at a time before we had to continue either on foot or hitch-hike on some peasant's wagon. At the moment, the coastal town of Cherbourg, France was around twenty miles away, and we were taking some time to sleep before we continued on. At least, the Redhead was. I found myself unable to drift off. Instead, I got up and walked around a bit, enjoying the silence, only broken by my companion stirring in her sleep every few minutes. Over the years, and through our various missions together, I’d discovered that she often sleep-talks. It's kind of funny sometimes, and one of the the few things she does that doesn’t lead to us fighting. At first, it was annoying, but it grew on me, and now I somewhat enjoy it. I was almost hoping the Redhead would mumble something, but she was silent, until I heard a faint, meek whimper.

"...Help..."

 

Akumako's POV

_ It was so loud. There was the firing of guns, the mechanical cries of akuma, screaming, crying, yelling... Over all of the clamor, I could barely hear my own tiny voice crying for my mother, who by that point was probably already dead. In a tiny, four-year-old ball, I hid in the corner behind a crate, hoping somebody would save me. The sounds gradually died down, but I continued to cry. _

_ "Mama! Help me! I'm scared! Mama!" My presumably dead mother gave no response to me. "...Help..." Heavy booted footsteps plodded across the creaky floorboards towards my hiding spot. The wooden crate was pulled back a bit, and I peeked out from behind my fingers under my hood at the person who had found me. It was not my mother, nor anyone else that I recognised. He was a tall man, dressed in a black coat with golden buttons and a gold crest emblazoned on it. A white mask covered part of his face and long hair as red as my own fell out from under a black hat. _

_ "Hey there, little one, it's okay now," the stranger assured me, "The monsters are gone now." He pulled a white handkerchief out of his pocket and gently pushed my hands away from my face to wipe away my tears. "Let's have a look at you, sweetie." He pushed down my hood and looked at my face. He picked up a lock of my my hair and smiled, staring right into my teary eyes. "You're a pretty one. You'll grow up to be a real beauty, I think. Come on," I was suddenly off the ground and being carried by my new-found savior, "I'll be looking after you from now on. My name is General Marian Cross. What's your name, little one?" _

_ I hesitated, but eventually managed to say my name, "Akumako." _

 

I woke up to someone shaking me. In a panic, my eyes flew open and I launched myself away from whoever was there. "Get away!" I shrieked, unable to recognize my surroundings or the young man in front of me.

"What the hell’s wrong with you?! It's me, moron!" Upon being yelled at, I snapped out of my fit of madness.

"Kanda?"

"No, it's Santa Claus here to give you presents in the middle of May. Of course it's Kanda!"

For once, no witty comeback popped into my head. I calmed myself down, recovering from my sudden panic attack and instead of snapping back at my companion, I said quietly, "Sorry, Kanda."

His expression changed from his usual scorn into total surprise. "What did you just say?"

"I said 'I'm sorry.' I freaked out on you, and it wasn't your fault. I'm sorry." I scooted back over to my bed of leaves and curled back onto it, resting my head on my folded-up coat. "I'll try going back to sleep. Again, I'm sorry I freaked out on you."

At first, I thought Kanda wouldn't reply, but then he suddenly said, "It's okay, Akumako." I bolted upright, my blue eyes widening in surprise.

"Did you just say my name?"

Kanda looked at me like I was crazy. "Last I checked, your name is still Akumako, so yeah."

"But you never call me by my name,  _ ever _ . You always call me 'Redhead' or ‘Freak.’"

"So what?

"So- Nevermind." I lay back down, deciding that the conversation wasn't going to go anywhere. Kanda was a stubborn ass and would be for the rest of his life, so saying anything on the matter wouldn't yield any result other than both of us getting pissed off. "I'm gonna get some more sleep. You should too, before the sun comes up." My head slammed back into my makeshift pillow and I shut my eyes again.

"Fine," Kanda grumbled, laying down around a foot or so away from me in the grass, "You're such a pain in the ass. Sometimes I wanna just chop you to bits, you know?"

"Yeah, yeah, love you too, Kanda."

 

Road's POV

"Awww, she's so cute when she's asleep!" I cooed as we watched Akumako and her Exorcist companion sleep from a distance, "Look at her face! It's the same as when she was just a baby!"

"How you still remember one single expression she had almost nineteen years ago is beyond me," Tyki sighed, "But I guess that's what happens when you spend every single night watching someone sleep, isn't it?"

I stuck my tongue out at the other Noah. "You say it like it's creepy or something!"

"It  _ IS _ creepy, Road!"

"I was just taking care of her, that's all." I smiled as I remembered the peaceful look the redheaded infant wore whenever she slept, with me tucked in next to her in my doll form. "She needed me then. She needed all of us."

"Then she grew up."

I nodded, a little sad at having missed so much of Akumako's life. "But she needs us now, Tyki. Just like Lord Millennium said, it's almost time, and we will need to be there to welcome the prodigal child."

 

Akumako's POV

I had slept oddly for the rest of the night. I wasn't quite tired, but I wasn't rested either. It seemed that bizarre dreams were going to become more and more common for me. Aside from the dream of the day General Cross found me, I'd had a second dream that night, and it was strangely... nice, though surely impossible. If you couldn't guess by the word "impossible," it was about Kanda. Just to help you understand the depths of impossibility by mind came up with, he was A) Smiling, like he was actually happy for once, B) Not trying to kill anyone, and C) Holding a baby. That's right. A baby. Yu Kanda, the most antisocial, human-hating person I know, maybe in the whole world, was holding a tiny infant all bundled up in a blanket and  _ smiling _ at it! My mind has whipped up some crazy stuff before then, but nothing  _ that _ unrealistic. Still, part of me hoped I would remember it. It was probably the only time I would ever see him smile, and even if it wasn’t real, it was heartwarming.

While we walked along the damp dirt road in silence, all I had was my thoughts. As per usual, Kanda didn't say a word or cast me the tiniest glance behind him. The way he acted around me in Mater really was an anomaly. Outside of insulting me or telling me to piss off, he almost never said anything to me, but that was just fine in my eyes. I didn't really take an interest in being belittled constantly. When we first met as kids, the first thing he said to me was "Cover up that disgusting cursed eye so I don't have to see it. Don't even look at me with that thing." That was almost nine years ago, and hasn’t gotten much nicer since. He still tried to kill me on a regular basis, and never seemed to feel any remorse for it. I get that he doesn't like cursed things, but it’s not like I asked to look like I do!

"Hey Redhead," Kanda suddenly asked, "Do you hate me?"

"Since when do you care if somebody hates you?"

"I just wanna know, alright? Now answer the question."

I thought about it for a moment, eventually coming to a conclusion. "Surprisingly, no," I told him, "I don't hate you. I probably should hate you from all the crap you've given me over the years, but I don't. What about you? Do you hate me?"

"No," he answered immediately, surprising me, "It’s not you I hate. It's that mark in your eye. You're cursed. That's what I hate."

"So... You don't hate me for being annoying?"

"No."

"Or never leaving you alone?"

"Not really."

"Or for stealing Mugen when we were fifteen?"

"That was you?!"

"So you really don't hate me either?"

Kanda glared over his shoulder at me. "For the last time, no, now drop it!"

"You brought it up!" 

“Well stop talking about it now!” 

The next few hours were almost totally silent, other than the wind in the sparse trees and the seagulls squawking over the sound of our boots. Eventually, as the sun started to sink, the sparkling blue ocean eventually came into view, along with the town of Cherbourg. Several ships were resting at the docks, some being loaded with food and goods, others having their cargo removed to be sold for profit, and one of them would soon be taking Kanda and I to Ireland to complete our mission.

A sudden rush of excitement overtook me and I immediately sprinted toward the town, thrilled at the prospect of travelling by ship. "We're almost there!"

"Hold it!" Kanda grabbed my collar as I shot past him.

"Ack!" I coughed, trying to breathe properly again, "Is choking me really necessary?"

"We're being followed."

I immediately stopped coughing and straightened myself out, carefully listening for movement. "How long?"

"Probably a few miles. I didn't notice because you were behind me, so maybe longer."

"Let's see who it is then." I willed my demon's eye to activate, turning the world back to grey. My eye flicked to the right and left, seeing no signatures other than Kanda's. I casually turned my head around to look behind me, locating two other scarlet signatures hiding behind a couple of trees. "There's two. Both human, behind the trees over there."

"The ones closest to us?"

"That's right. Should I take care of it?" We nodded at each other and I partially activated my weapon. It hurt a bit, aching to be fully activated, but I just needed the blades on the back of my forearm at the moment, and I wasn’t willing to risk losing control again. I dashed across the gap between us and the trees, drawing my arm back as I approached and thrusting it out behind the trunk where I assumed my target's throat would be.

"Ah!"

I grinned savagely, filled with the pleasant satisfaction of knowing I could easily kill the person hiding from me. "Put your hands where I can see them and came out very slowly!" I ordered.

A hand shot out from either side of the tree's trunk "I'm doing it, I'm doing it! Don't kill me!" a familiar voice pleaded as he edged out from his hiding place.

The sense of savage satisfaction dissipated instantly as soon as the first bit of red hair inched out from behind the tree. “God dammit, Lavi.”


	7. Snapped

Once Lavi had calmed down after Kanda and I attacking, we - meaning I - managed to convince him and Bookman to accompany us to the town up ahead like they were sent to, rather than abandon us and return to HQ. Another fifteen or so minutes of walking brought us to the outskirts of town, which were, for the most part, empty. As we made our way inward, I, or rather, my stomach, decided it was time to stop and find something to eat. It only took one ridiculously loud rumble to get the boys to agree.

It didn't take long to find a suitable restaurant, and with the place empty, it took even less time to get a seat and have food ordered. Actually, I alone probably ordered enough to clear out the kitchen, seeing as people with my appetite were less than common on this planet.

"Parasitic-type Innocence or not, I'm still shocked you can eat that much and not gain a single pound," Lavi laughed.

"Yeah, well, a girl's gotta eat," I shrugged nonchalantly, just a hint of a smirk on my face. "By the way, Lavi, you still haven't told me what you and Bookman were doing hiding behind trees. Trying to sneak up on us?"

A quiet, young waitress brought over a small plate of soft white bread slices and set them on the table for us. "Ah... S-some bread... Complementary... For you... Ah, enjoy!" The poor girl's face was as red as my hair when she scurried away.

I didn't even attempt to hide it when I dragged the bread towards myself. "Speak, human!" I demanded with mock evilness. I noticed Kanda flinch ever so slightly beside me, and Bookman's indifferent expression flickered for a moment, but I didn't have time to figure out what was wrong before they were both back to normal.  _ What was that about? _ My eyes narrowed a tiny bit, but I let it slide. I bit into a thick bread slice, happy to have something other than the bland rations Kanda carried around. _Mmm... French bread..._ Lavi was still silent, and I glared at him viciously. "Are you gonna explain what you were doing, or will I have to beat it out of you?" I was only half joking. My patience was wearing thin already, and being hungry didn't help much.

"Jeez, you're on edge today, aren't you?" Lavi threw his hands in the air defensively. "Didn't Komui tell you guys?

"Tell us what?" Kanda snapped, finally saying something.

"We're coming with you to Ireland. He said that he'd already told you, or at least one of you. We'll be helping you out." 

"We don't need help!" both of us shouted at the same time, though when I thought about it, I did remember Kanda telling me that in Mater.

"Akumako and I can take care of ourselves!" Kanda growled, "So go back to the Order!"

I gazed in astonishment at him. "That may just be the nicest thing you've ever said about me, apart from saying that you don't actually hate me."

Lavi's eye almost popped out of his head. "Wait, he said what?!" Even Bookman seemed somewhat surprised. "But Yu, you hate everybody! You even told me once that she drives you crazy! Unless..." His dumbstruck expression quickly turned into a Cheshire Cat grin. "Ooh, I get it. Somebody's in loooooove!" Both of us turned bright red, Kanda most likely out of embarrassment and me simply from the prospect, as outrageous as it was. Seriously, we try to kill each other regularly! "You are, aren't you?" Lavi continued tormenting Kanda, whose jaw was clenched tightly shut, "You should've said so sooner! I would've helped you out!" By now, Kanda's face had gone a darker shade of red than my hair, which could've been embarrassment or homicidal rage. Probably both.

"Lavi, stop tormenting Kanda!" I demanded, coming to Kanda's aid for the first time ever.

His gaze flicked between us a few times, before grinning even wider. "You're already together? You two make such a great couple! You're perfect for each other! I hear wedding bells already!"

Kanda and I exchanged a glance, telepathically sending messages.  _ Are you thinking what I'm thinking? _ his eyes said.

_ For once, I think so _ , I nodded back. And in perfect unison, we both punched Lavi in the face as hard as we could.

He fell out of his chair to the floor with a heavy thud. "Yep... Perfect." Lavi twitched a few more times, then fell unconscious.

The same shy waitress saw the short commotion, and was staring at us, clearly unnerved our sudden attack on Lavi. I shot her a smile and told her, "Don't worry about him. We'll clean him up on the way out."

As promised, we picked up Lavi once we were finished eating. He was still unconscious, so we had to carry him. I'd intended to do it, but Kanda plucked him off of my shoulder before I could take a single step.

"He's bigger than you, and I'm stronger," was his reasoning. That may have been true, but I was plenty strong enough to carry Lavi. I was strong enough to pick up and throw Master Cross by the time I was thirteen, so carrying another teenager wouldn't be a problem. I figured it was a guy thing, so I didn't protest. If he wanted to do all the heavy lifting, pun intended, then I'd be happy to let him.

"Suit yourself, but that means you're carrying him all the way to the docks." Before he could change his mind and dump Lavi on me again, I skipped away, my excitement from before coming back. I'd always loved travelling by ship, but hadn't gotten a chance to since I was twelve. I was looking forward to reaching Ireland too, seeing as I'd been wanting to be assigned there for years, but nothing had ever turned up. It was bound to happen sooner or later, though. I just hoped it wasn't a dead end.

Lavi woke up shortly before we made it to our ship. He was sporting a large, purplish bruise on his forehead, and his head was probably pounding. Still, he managed to walk the rest of the way on his own, though he was grumbling the whole way about my and Kanda's bad temper. When I heard it, I snickered, but tried to keep it to myself.

Before long, we boarded the huge passenger ship and established ourselves in our adjoining cabins. I got the centre room, while Lavi and Bookman shared the room to the left and Kanda took the room on the right. Of course, there wasn't much to do, since we carried very little with us. I dropped my pack on the floor and flopped onto the bed. It was small, but comfortable. One of the perks of being an Exorcist was that we always got to be in first class, legally or not. Sure, we were frequently in mortal peril, but at least we were treated well.

As I laid there, staring at the ceiling, the door to Lavi and Bookman's room creaked open. Heavy footsteps told me that my visitor was the other redheaded Exorcist on the mission.

"Whaddya want, Lavi?" I mumbled, stretching out on my bed.

Once he started talking, I could clearly picture the annoying smirk he just had to be wearing, even with my eyes closed. "So, you and Kanda? I must admit, I wouldn't have predicted you two hooking up."

"Lavi!" I immediately snapped out of my peaceful state, flicked my eyes open and sat straight up. If looks could kill, he would've been dead on the spot. "What part of a punch in the face don’t you understand? Quit it!" He didn't let up. Instead, he continued joking around and playfully mocking me, even though he knew it pissed me off.

"Oh, come on!" Lavi teased, seemingly oblivious to my quickly rising temper, "Tell me what it's like, dating Kanda. And I'm curious, is he as grouchy when you two are  _ alone _ as he is the rest of the time?"

With that, I reached my limit, and everything after that went black.

I woke up in a different room, disoriented and with a pounding headache. I groaned and rolled onto my back, though I soon regretted it. It felt like there was a nasty bruise on the back of my skull, and it wasn't likely to go away for at least a week. It attempted to grab it and protect my head from further damage, only to find my wrists bound together.

"What the hell is this?" I grumbled, trying to wiggle out of the ropes.

"You're not getting free that way, Akumako." Not anticipating one of my companions to be in the room, I whipped my head over to the right, staring Kanda right in the eyes.

"Are you trying to give me a heart attack?!" I complained, irritated and confused.

"Quit being so melodramatic. You'll be fine. Now, you have some explaining to do."

I blinked in confusion. "I do?"

"Yeah, and you're gonna do it now."

I nodded slowly, unsure of what was going on. "Right. Explaining. And what exactly am I supposed to be explaining?"

Kanda narrowed his eyes. "Don't play dumb. You know exactly what I'm talking about."

"No, I don't think I do. There was Lavi being an obnoxious moron, but that's not my fault."

"He's always like that, but you've never tried to kill him before!"

I blinked a few times, sure I’d misheard him. "Come again?"

Kanda stared at me like a mushroom had sprouted on my head. "Do you seriously not remember it?" I shook my head. I had no memory of any attempts of homicide recently. "Akumako, you tried to kill him. You were strangling him and even I couldn't pry you off. I had to knock you out before you'd let go!"

"So that's why there's a bruise..."

"This is serious, Akumako!" He moved from his spot next to the bed and grabbed my shoulders, pushing me down from leaning on my elbow, which had taken some shuffling to accomplish. "You just tried to strangle another Exorcist to death! I managed to convince Lavi and Bookman to not report it, but if anyone finds out, there'll be one hell of a shitstorm around you! Do you get it?"

I nodded wordlessly, even though there were some things I still didn’t quite understand. I'd never seen a display of emotion from Kanda like this over anyone, other than anger. Suddenly, he seemed to really care about what happened to me, and this level of concern couldn't be faked. At this short distance, I could see the worry in his black eyes, only a few inches away. I didn't understand why he was worrying over me of all people, but I could see the depth of what he felt. It actually made me feel somewhat happy to see that he cared, despite his usual cold demeanour. Still waters run deep, isn't that what they say?

Then, I found myself wondering, why  _ was  _ he suddenly so upset? Normally, Kanda just yelled when he was angry with me, but if anything, he seemed afraid. Afraid for  _ my _ wellbeing. Why the sudden change? "Kanda, are you okay? You're acting... different."

For a second, I thought Kanda was going to yell at me, as usual. Instead, he did something I never would've expected from him. He laughed. In fact, he laughed hard enough that his arms were shaking too much to hold him up, and he wound up falling on me. He caught himself on the forearms before he crushed me, but the air in my lungs still vanished. Still laughing, but calming down, Kanda rested his forehead against mine. I didn't move, but every cell in my body went into a frenzy. My heart started racing, my face heated up, and my eyes opened up incredibly wide.  _ Too close! Too close! _

"Am  _ I  _ okay?" He chuckled, " _ I'm _ acting different? Akumako, you just had a psychotic break and got hit on the head, and you're asking  _ me  _ that?" Kanda sighed and stroked my cheek with his thumb. "You're an odd one, you know that? You're really something special."


	8. Chapter 8

After a few days, the ship docked in an Irish port. Kanda and I didn't talk about what happened in his room, even to each other. I wasn't sure what to make of any of it, both Kanda's strange behaviour before as well as why he didn't even acknowledge it, but I chose to leave it alone. Lavi had stopped his obnoxious teasing. Actually, he didn’t say much of anything and he continuously avoided me, but we still saw each other at meals and such. He tried to pretend like everything was normal and fine, but I could tell how scared he was by me now. Lavi tried to hide behind his scarf, but I'd still been able to she dark purple bruise around his neck. I still didn't remember attacking him, but that just made the remorse even worse. Of course, Kanda had told me all about it, but it still seemed to me like I hadn't been there at all.

 

Lavi's POV

I shouldn't have been teasing Akumako. I knew that. Messing with her was like riding a wild horse. It'd buck you off, probably kick you, but it would leave once you'd learned your lesson. I would've expected that. Hell, it happened earlier the very same day when she and Kanda punched me in the face. I teased them all the time, and that's what usually happened.

She'd never tried to kill me before.

She had me a foot off the ground with one hand around my throat. It seemed effortless, the way she held me up like that. I knew right away that she wasn’t playing. The amount of force crushing my neck screamed lethal intent. Akumako was going to kill me! Even more terrifying than the thought of dying, she was enjoying it. That wicked grin on her face... She looked happy in a sick, twisted way, and it seemed so natural, but that wasn’t the face of my friend. There was no way the girl trying to murder me was Akumako!

I clawed at her hand and kicked at her stomach, trying to break free, but she barely even flinched. Her grip only seemed to get stronger as my body shut down from the lack of air. I tried to choke out a plea for mercy, but her grip was too strong for even that much. I thrashed around in a last attempt to escape. My vision started to blur and dim and I grew weaker by the second. Just when I was on the verge of unconsciousness, Yu's door slammed open.

"Would you mind being quiet in here? It sounds like- WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?!" Akumako started jerking around a bit. Yuu must have been trying to pull her off me. It didn't work though. Instead, her hand tightened further around my throat.

"Shine, ekusoshisuto!" She hissed. It may have just been my brain dying, but her voice sounded metallic, empty like a machine. Perhaps it was just a hallucination, but I could swear her eyes flickered yellow for a second. Suddenly, I was released and fell to the floor like a sack of potatoes, coughing and gasping.

A half-second later, Akumako collapsed as well, completely limp. If it weren't for her faint breathing, I would've thought she was dead. At least I was still alive, too.

 

Akumako's POV

I felt horrible. I was afraid. To snap and attack a friend like that... how could I not be afraid of myself? Had it happened before? Would it happen again? I didn't want to think about it, but with the looks I was being given during our silent walk to our hotel, I couldn't help it. And on top of that, I couldn't shake the feeling that there were some who almost expected it, and I was staring at two of their backs. Lavi only looked at me with fear now, which I understood perfectly. Kanda, on the other hand, almost seemed to pity me. No anger, hate, frustration, or even blame. Why did it have to be pity?

The hotel that had been selected for us came into view within a few minutes. It wasn't a large or fancy building, but it looked like it would be cozy. 'Hotel' really isn't really the right word. 'Inn' is a bit more accurate. It was a humble, cozy-looking, rural inn. Before we entered, Bookman pulled everyone off to the side for a quick discussion.

"Due to certain _events_ in the ship, the housing arrangements have been changed a bit. Originally, we all would have had our own room. Instead, Lavi, you'll share a room with me as we typically do." Lavi nodded in confirmation. "And as for you, Akumako, you're not going to like your arrangement." I already wasn't overly keen on it. The only logical assumption was that I'd be stuck with Kanda. "You're sharing a room with Kanda." Called it. "But that's not all of it. Because of your outburst, we're keeping you under supervision 24 hours a day until we return to Headquarters. To make it possible without drawing too much attention from the locals, we'll be operating under the facade of you and Kanda being a young couple."

It took a moment for the new plan to register. "Let me get this straight. You want me to pretend to be married to _him_?" I jerked my thumb at Kanda, who stood to my right. "Why?"

"Because you need to be supervised, Akumako. This way, Kanda can keep an eye on you at all times without drawing unwanted attention. It's just until the mission is over, so just work with it until then, alright?"

I sighed, knowing that arguing would likely be fruitless, "Alright. Fine. I'll go with it, but I don't have to like it. And what about you and Lavi? Are you our 'relatives?'"

"That's right. Lavi will be your brother, and I'll be your great-uncle." I stifled a laugh. Clearly, Bookman knew he was old enough to be our grandfather but didn't want to be called 'gramps.' Curiously enough, Lavi was dead silent. Normally, he would've made some joke about Bookman being old, but he said nothing. I glanced over, noticing the disappointment in his eyes. I didn't ask, but I hoped he was okay. "Do you all understand the plan?" Nobody said 'no.' "Good. Let's go inside and get our rooms."

The check-in process didn't take long. It was getting out of the conversation with the innkeeper that took forever. I'd always been warned that Irish people were chatty, but this woman could talk like nobody's business, and she had quite the accent as well. "Oh, so you're newlyweds, are ye?" I managed to understand, "I take it this'll be your honeymoon then?"

"Um..." I glanced at Kanda, hoping he might respond. I had no idea what to say, and, to my dismay, he didn't seem to either. "I suppose so. We had to wait for a while before we had the money to come here, but I think it'll be worth the wait. Don't you think so, _Yu_?" Kanda went rigid and I tried not to laugh. Just because I had to pretend to be his wife didn't mean I couldn't mess with him. Hell, it was a perfect opportunity, and I would gladly take it!

I should've realised that would backfire immediately. As if we really were a couple, he put his arm around my waist and pulled me way closer than I was comfortable with. "I sure hope so, _tsuma._ "

I grit my teeth but tried to keep looking pleasant. _That bastard just called me a housewife!_

Before I could punch him, elbow him, or otherwise cause discomfort, Kanda pressed his lips into my hair, imitating a young man in love. I only freaked out a little bit. "Two can play at that game, Akumako," he whispered. At first, I thought it was my imagination, but no. He intended to torment me right back. Great.

"Oh, you're orientals!" The innkeeper seemed pleasantly surprised, even though it was pretty obvious neither Kanda or I were your everyday Victorian European. The 'oriental' comment jointly ticked us off a bit, even if she hadn't meant it in a negative way. "Are ye from China, then?"

"Japan," we both corrected at the same time.

"Oh, my apologies. In a little village like ours, ye don't see many foreigners, so I'm sorry if I've offended ye."

"It's alright," I told her. "You meant nothing by it. Now, I don't mean to be rude, but we've been traveling for quite a while. We'd like to get settled into our room and get some rest."

"Oh, of course, dearie. Should've known you two would be weak as a kitten!" At long last, she handed me our key. "Here ye are, lass. Your husband and yourself have the room at the end o' the hall, next floor up. Ye let me know if ye'll be needing anything."

"Of course," I smiled and dragged Kanda along before the innkeeper could start talking again. The moment the door closed behind us, I took hold of his long hair and hissed, "Don't you _ever_ call me 'tsuma' again!"

"Ow! Let go of me, Redhead!"

"Never again, you hear me?"

"Alright! Alright, fine! I'm sorry! I was just messing with you! Just let-" Kanda looked at me and froze. "Akumako, calm down."

"I _am_ calm!"

"Then why are your eyes changing colour?!"

Now it was my turn to freeze. "What the hell are you talking about?" Without speaking, Kanda pointed at the small round mirror hung next to the door. Just as he'd said, my eyes weren't the bright, clear sky blue they had always been. Instead, my reflection stared back at me with cold golden eyes. Eyes that didn't belong to me. "What... I don't... What is this?" As my unexpected anger at Kanda subsided, my eyes flickered back into their normal colour.

"Akumako..."

"What was that?" I asked, confused and disturbed by what had just happened.

"It's not my place to say."

"So you know?"

He was clearly hesitant, but conceded, "I do."

"Then tell me."

"I can't."

"Tell me!" I demanded again, unable to understand why Kanda was refusing to answer.

"I can't tell you, Akumako! I swore I wouldn't!"

"Swore to who?"

Kanda sighed, knowing he'd said too much, "General Cross. He made me promise not to say anything."

My sharp nails dug into my palm hard enough to draw blood. "What's so damn important that I can't know about it? It's about me, dammit! I have the right to know!" One wrong word, and Kanda was going to have my fist in his face.

"No, I can't-" Wrong word.

 

Kanda's POV 

With only the split-second flash of gold in her eyes as warning, Akumako lashed out and clocked me harder than I thought she possibly could. A swift, forceful kick to the stomach dropped me to the floor and knocked the wind clear out of me. Before I could get up, she pinned me down and wrapped an impossibly strong hand around my throat, gradually squeezing tighter and tighter. "Anata ga shinu, ekusoshisuto," [1] Akumako hissed with a wickedly gleeful grin on her face, "Watashi wa anata o korosu." [2]

"Akumako," I gasped, "Please, stop! You're not- Don't let it control you!"

I could see that my words fell on deaf ears, even as my vision grew dark and blurry. Just before I slipped into complete oblivion, Akumako leaned down next to my ear and whispered so gently and sweetly, "Sayonara, watashi no hansamuna shitai." [3]

* * *

 

Much to my surprise, I woke up. On our bed, nonetheless. Remembering that I should have died right there on the floor, I looked around the room, finding it empty and dark. A quick glance out the open window told me that the sun had long since set. _Have I really been unconscious that long?_ I sat up and gingerly rubbed my bruised throat. My groggy mind started to clear and the emptiness of the room suddenly struck me as odd. There was nobody watching me, and the silence from the rest of the inn made me uneasy. _Where is everyone? And where’s Akumako?_

A second, longer look at the window revealed to me a moonlit picture that left me confused at first. On the small table in front of the window sat an even smaller pillow, and on that pillow laid a single folded scrap of paper. It was oddly picturesque, actually, with the sheer curtains fluttering behind in the soft breeze. I walked over to get a better look. There was something written on the note, but it was too dark to read it. A brief search through the room rewarded me with some candles and matches.

Once the room was properly lit, I returned to the table. This time, the pleasant, moonlit scene was gone, instead leaving me anxious and uneasy. The gleaming emblem marked the ‘pillow’ as an Exorcist’s coat. The fact that it was left behind like that was troubling. Hoping my anxiety was unfounded, I unfolded the note.

I stared at the words for what felt like several minutes before they registered, and for once, I felt my stoic composure slipping. In the centre of the note was Akumako's handwriting, shaky though it was and dotted with tear stains. Once it had registered, I jumped out the window into the fog, shouting her name, her last message ringing in my head. Though it was only two simple words, they haunted me long after I read them.

**_“Forgive me.”_ **

* * *

 

Akumako's POV 

I'd underestimated how cold it would get at night in this town. During the day it wasn't so bad, but my teeth were rattling against each other and I was chilled to the bone, even with my long sleeves. If I hadn't left my coat behind it wouldn't have been so bad, but where I was going, I couldn't risk taking such an obvious identifier. "Where the hell _am_ I going?" I asked myself. I had nowhere to go and no one to turn to. "I really should've thought this through before I ran off," I chided myself. "Then again, there wasn't much time for thinking, was there?" I sat down against a small tree along the road out of town. I'd been on the move for most of the day, and the thick fog obscured nearly everything, so I doubted the others would find me. _I'll be fine if I sit down for a few minutes. As 'fine' as I'll ever be._

While I sat there curled up in a ball, I couldn't help but think of the life I was leaving behind: Lenalee's smiling face; Lavi's stupid antics that, while irritating, always made me laugh; Komui's projects-gone-wrong; Master Cross, the closest thing to a father I’d ever had; I even thought of the new kid, Allen, who I hardly knew. But for some reason, I knew I would miss Kanda most of all. Even if I didn't always show it and sometimes it drove me up the wall, I loved the Order and being a part of it, but somehow, he's what made it home. Every fight, every threat, every time he reluctantly helped me... And I was abandoning it all. "I have to," I told myself, my voice breaking, "It's over. It was over the second I attacked Kanda. No... When I attacked Lavi. Dammit! It's all gone to hell! It's all gone now!" I could hold tears back anymore. Full-on sobs choked out of my throat no matter how hard I tried to keep them back. Now that the levee had broken, I had to admit to myself that I’d always known there was something dark inside me, but it apparently my self-control wasn’t strong enough. "I tried... God knows I tried! It was always there, whatever _this_ is, but I tried to conceal it! I tried to hide it!" I pleaded to the empty night, "I tried to hide it, to control it! But now... Now they know... Now _I_ know... Just what I can do..." I was starting to understand just what it was that Kanda refused to tell me, and why, but it was too late now.

I sat there like that for what felt like hours, crying in the night's fog. Most passers-by probably would've thought I was a ghost haunting that road. Part of me felt like I was, until a hand brushed away some of the tears on my face.

"Poor girl, out here alone in the dark. What's wrong? Why're you crying?" The voice of a young girl cut through the stillness of the night like a knife, startling me.

I opened my eyes to look at her, but it was too foggy and dark to see her. "Who... Who are you?"

"I'm Road. Road Kamelot," she introduced herself sweetly, "Now, tell me why you're crying."

"It's nothing," I sniffled, hesitant to share my troubles with a stranger, seeing how the wrong stranger could put me in a lot of trouble.

"Having a domestic, then? That's what the lady at the inn said, anyway." My ears perked up at mention of the inn. _She came from the town? Is she going to tell the others where I am?_ "You are the young woman who went missing this morning, aren’t you?"

"Yeah... I am," I decided to stick to the truth as much as possible.

"It's okay. Don't worry. I won't tell anybody I found you here, unless you want me to," she assured me, "You clearly need some time away from your husband, if he's making you cry like that."

"He's not my husband!" I snapped before calming down, "For our job... We had to pretend... Look, it's not your problem. You don't need to get caught up in it."

"Alright," she conceded, "You don't have to talk about it. But you _do_ need somewhere warm and dry to sleep tonight. You'll catch pneumonia if you stay out here." Road held out a petite hand to me in offering. "Come stay with me and my family. We have a house up the road a ways, and more than enough space. How 'bout it?" Even without being able to see her face, I could tell she was smiling.

After weighing the options, I agreed, "Okay. I'll go. Thank you, Miss Road."

She laughed, "It's just 'Road!' No need to be so formal."

It was my turn to smile. I could already feel my sadness lifting a bit. "Thank you, Road. My name's Akumako, by the way."

"It's a pleasure to meet you, Akumako. We're going to be great friends!"

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Translations:
> 
> [1] “You’re going to die, Exorcist.”
> 
> [2] “I’m going to kill you.”
> 
> [3] “Goodbye, my handsome corpse.


	9. Sleep, Sweet Child

When Road said "house," I thought she meant an actual house. As in the typical smallish building a normal family lives in. I was mistaken.

"You live  _ here _ _?!_ " I stared incredulously at the huge mansion Road claimed to be her family's home. My surprise actually let me forget my emotional turmoil for a moment. "This place is huge!"

"We've got a lot of money, so yeah. We live in big houses," she smiled like everybody lived in gigantic manors like hers. "Come on in! I can have some servants get a room and a meal ready for you. You're hungry, right?"

"Oh, no, I'm okay," I tried to deny before my traitorous empty stomach let out a loud cry. "...I guess some food wouldn't hurt."

"Follow me then!" She grabbed my hand and led me away into the labyrinth of a manor, eventually pulling me into what looked like a large dressing room. "Before you eat, let's get you into some new clothes. Yours are all damp and cold from the fog outside." Like well-practiced choreography in a play, three female servants hustled in and got to work. One of them quickly stripped off the remainder of my damp Black Order uniform and whisked it away without a word. The second servant slipped a white silk kimono over my shoulders and worked with the last servant to tie a red obi around my waist. When they finished, Road squealed in delight, "It's perfect! Turn around and look at yourself!"

I turned to look in the mirror, and was surprised at how good it looked. The traditional dress accentuated my Japanese features beautifully, and the obi matched my hair almost perfectly. The cherry blossom pattern along the hem lended me an air of feminine delicateness that my uniforms never did. I looked like an entirely different person. Even my eyes were different. They still were an intense, chilling gold instead of the familiar, gentle blue I knew. The black pentacle I'd learned to hate stared back at me mockingly, and I covered it with my hand in shame. "Do you have anything I could use as an eyepatch?"

"What for? Is there something wrong with your eye?"

"It’s cursed. I prefer to keep it covered, so people don't see."

"Cursed? Who told you that?"

"Someone I work with. Well...  _ used  _ to work with."

"Don't listen to that nonsense." Road pulled my hand away from my eye and assured me, "You're not cursed. That star marks you as special. Don't hide it. Flaunt it and shout to the world 'Look at me, I'm here!' Now come on, you still need to eat."

I expected maybe a bowl of soup and some bread, like most people would provide. Instead, Road's servants provided an entire banquet for me. I ate it all, hardly leaving a crumb, but she didn't seem very shocked, or even surprised at all. Just pleased. "So, did you like it?"

I sighed in content, "That may have been one of the best meals I've ever had. Thank you, Road."

"No need to thank me! Do you want me to show you to your room now? I bet you're exhausted."

Once she mentioned it, I was suddenly whomped with a tired stick, and no wonder, having been on the move until Road found me. "That'd be great."

The mansion was beautiful. The dark wood floors in the halls were smooth and shiny, reflecting the light of the candles lit here and there throughout the house enchantingly, and the walls were painted with rich, dark colours. I admired the paintings on the wall, some of which were landscapes, and some were portraits. There weren't a lot of them, however, and many showed the same people. Though I liked the paintings, I found a few traits many had to be a bit odd: Many of the people in the portraits had grey skin and crosses on their foreheads.  _ I wonder what that's about? _ I thought, curious, but unconcerned.

Eventually, we reached a hallway with portraits that really caught my attention. There were twelve doors, each one bearing a portrait of different people of different ages, races and genders, but they all had two things in common: Eyes as blue as the summer sky, and a black star in one of them. "Road, who are these people?"

"In the pictures? They're my family. Those were their rooms, but they're all gone now."

“Gone as in dead, I’m guessing?”

“That’s right,” she confirmed sadly, “It’s too bad you couldn’t meet them. I bet they would’ve adored you. Anyway,” Road smiled again as she opened the door, “I’ll tell you more about them later if you want! Talking about sad things like that before bed leads to bad dreams. Now, do you like your room?”

I walked in and was instantly overcome with a wave of nostalgia. Everything about it felt so familiar, like a dream I’d long since forgotten. The silver stars painted on the ceiling over a dark blue sky felt like shining glimmers of the past, the four-poster bed in the middle hiding memories behind sheer lavender curtains. The huge, strangely-coloured stuffed animals in the corner smiled at me in remembrance.

“So? Is it okay?” Road snapped be out of my thoughts, “We haven’t changed out the furniture or anything in a long time, but-”

“No, it’s fine,” I assured, still in a nostalgic daze, “It just feels so familiar. I was just a little stunned by it, that’s all. I must be more tired than I realized.”

As I made my way to the bed, my vision began to blur and my body felt incredibly heavy. I clumsily opened the sheer curtain and all but fell onto the mattress, so soft and warm.

Road followed me with that sweet smile of hers. She pushed the curtain aside with far more grace than I had and sat down beside me. “Such a mess,” she mused while I resisted my eyelids’ desire to close, “But that’s only natural. The last few days must’ve been so tiring for you.” I wanted to ask what she meant, but my mouth wouldn’t move. Road pulled the dark violet comforter over me, like she was tucking in a child. “Just go to sleep now, Akumako. When you wake up, it’ll all be better. I’ll sing a little lullaby for you, if you want.” Without waiting for even a nod, she started singing, though it sounded hazy and unclear in my fading consciousness. In the last few lines, my eyes finally closed, and consciousness finally left me after I heard the familiar,  _ “Maybe it’s because I remember when we were two little boys.” _

* * *

 

_ A black-and-violet chessboard stretched beneath my feet all the way to the horizon where it blended into the starry sky above. It was perfectly still; motionless and silent. _

_ Without warning, the ground began to shake like an earthquake. On either side of me, a door pushed its way through the chessboard. Ten feet to my right was an ornate, heart-shaped door covered in red and black diamonds and framed in gold. On my left was a much simpler door made of wood. Looking closer, I realised that it was actually the door to my own room at the Order. The little star I carved above the handle proved it. But why were they there? _

_ "Akumako?" A familiar voice called from behind me. I spun around to face Kanda, who stared at me incredulously as if I were a ghost.  _

_ “Kanda…” Seeing his face brought all my guilt roiling to the surface. “What’re you doing here?” _

_ “I should be asking you that. Where have you been? Why did you run away?” _

_ “I tried to kill two other Exorcists, Kanda. It’s pretty obvious that I’m dangerous to be around.”  _

_ “Akumako, we could’ve handled it if you stayed.” Kanda moved closer, but stepped back when I flinched away. _

_ “Or you could’ve wound up dead! All those things you hid from Komui and the others, telling me to keep my head down and my mouth shut… The truth was right in front of me the whole time, wasn’t it? You warned me, but I was to stupid to realise-” _

_ “Akumako, stop-” _

_ “The Demon Exorcist,” I said, having pieced together the puzzle, “That’s why you told me to keep my head down. It wasn’t because it was a secret. It was because you knew it was me, wasn’t it?” _

_ “No, it’s not-” _

_ “Haven’t you people lied to her enough?” Road’s sweet voice interrupted from behind me, “You’ve all told so many lies.” I turned around, finding her sitting on top of the checkered door. _

_ Kanda glared at her furiously, “Who the hell are you?” _

_ Road scowled back, “ _ I’m _ someone who thinks Akumako here deserves better than what she’s gotten at the hands of Exorcists.” _

_ “Road, what are you doing here?” _

_ She turned to me and smiled, “I’m just here to help you, Akumako,” she turned back to Kanda and let her scowl return, “Unlike some.” _

_ “Just what are you trying to say?” Kanda growled. _

_ “I’m saying that you’re not here for her. You just want what she is.” _

_ “You’re wrong!” he shouted in denial. _

_ “Again with the lying!” she chided, “How hard is it to just tell the truth? The Black Order sees her as a weapon and nothing more! You’re just here to reclaim your weapon and brainwash her back into following you!” _

_ “You’re wrong!” Kanda denied again, growing angrier with each word Road said. _

_ “Look at him, Akumako. He’s still trying to keep up the facade, as if you’d believe him and go back.” _

_ “Road, I do believe him,” I told her, earning surprise from both of them, “Sure, we fight, and he’s kept secrets, but never once has he lied to me. On the contrary, he’s taken measures to protect me, even though it’s supposed to be his job to kill me.” _

_ She replied calmly, “But he kept your identity from you. What right does he-” _

_ “I didn’t tell her because she’d be killed if she knew who she was!” Kanda shouted angrily. “Akumako, don’t listen to her! Come back with me! We’ll work this out!” _

_ “Go back to a place where they her dead?” Road scoffed. _

_ “Shut up!” He roared. “Akumako, listen to me. The Order doesn’t have to know anything. Even if they find out, the people at HQ love you. They’ll all find a way to protect you! None of us want to kill you!” _

_ “If you don’t want to kill her, then why did you agree to do it?” Road pointed out. _

_ Kanda looked at the ground shamefully. “I was a just kid when they asked me. They figured I could do it because I was strong, and I didn’t care about anyone, and I’d already been forced to kill a friend, so they assumed I could kill another comrade. But they’re wrong! I only kept the assignment to try to find a way to keep the order from ever being given in the first place!” _

_ Road sneered, “Do you actually believe this, Akumako?” _

_ I thought about it, and looking at Kanda’s pleading face, it was hard not to. We fight. We drive each other insane. He can seem apathetic and crude, but I’d seen firsthand that Kanda was more than he first appeared, and he was a terrible actor. He could never fake this. _

_ “I believe him.” _

_ “So you’re going with him?” _

_ “I think I should,” I started walking towards Kanda and my old door, “Even if we have our problems, he’s been in my life since I was a kid, and though the Order has kept things from me, it’s the closest thing to a family I’ve ever had.” Kanda breathed a sigh of relief upon hearing my decision. _

_ Until Road cried in anger, “The Black Order are the ones who _ murdered _ your family!” _


	10. Failed

Kanda’s POV 

“Akumako!” My eyes snapped open, and the world I saw had completely changed. No checkered floor, no doors, no strange girl cajoling Akumako. And no Akumako. I picked myself up from out of the dirt where I’d fallen, shouting her name, foolishly hoping she would somehow hear me. But there was nothing. Nothing but my own voice dying away in the fog. Stiff and cold, I took off running down the road, calling for Akumako at the top of my lungs until I was hoarse. _Dammit, woman!_ I inwardly cursed, _Where the hell are you?!_

I don’t know how long I ran or how far I’d gone before I heard someone call my name, “Yu!” Not the voice I wanted to hear. Lavi and Bookman materialised out of the fog, the younger looking quite out-of-breath. “Yu! Where’ve you been? We’ve been looking for you for ages!”

“What’s it matter?” I snapped, my hands clenched into tight fists.

“You disappeared without even leaving a note!” Lavi hollered, “We had no way of knowing what happened! First Akumako vanishes, then you! What were we supposed to think?”

“You think I care?” I snarled, “You found me, now leave me alone so I can find Akumako.”

This time, Bookman interjected, “And what exactly do you plan to do if you somehow find her?”

I glared, sure he was insinuating something, “Meaning what exactly?”

“Are you going to be able to do your job or have emotions clouded your proper judgement?”

“What do you mean, ‘Do my-’” Mid-sentence, I realised exactly what he meant. “You knew.”

“Of course we did. As Bookmen, we were privy to all information regarding the Demon Exorcist Akumako.” The old man gave me a pointed look. “And I do mean _all_ of it.”

I returned his gaze with malice, “And what exactly are you getting at, old man?”

He narrowed his eyes at my insolence but answered, “Not only has she begun awakening as a Demon Exorcist, but she’d also run away, likely to rejoin the Millennium Earl. You were assigned to kill her if that happened.” I tried to cut him off, but he kept going, “Of course, you should have done that the moment she attacked Lavi. Yet you didn’t. You even asked us to overlook the incident.”

“Your point?”

“Your emotions have gotten the better of you, Kanda,” he chided, “Even if you found her, you won’t kill her like you agreed, will you?”

I scowled at the pair menacingly. “Not if I can save her.” I turned on my heel and bolted, unwilling to waste one more moment being lectured about my job. I knew I’d broken my agreement. After being broken for so long, there was no way I could ever un-break it.

* * *

 

Eight Years Ago 

I was on my way to the cafeteria for dinner when I heard a loud, excited squeal, “General Cross!” Akumako. The cursed half-breed. I stood just around the corner, watching them and waiting for them to leave so I could get my meal in peace.

I watched as the Freak ran up to the General, shrieking like a delighted maniac. I watched as he picked her up in a warm hug and laughed happily, like I imagined any half-decent father might. I listened to them talk about this, that, and the other thing. Not even anything all that interesting. It was weird how happy it seemed to make them. It was weird that they did that. It was weird how _normal_ it seemed. And it was weird that _those_ two were the ones acting that way.

I found it unsettling.

Impatient, I made a small sound of annoyance. Freak didn’t seem to notice, but General Cross’s eye immediately darted to me. His expression shifted for just a moment in a way I couldn’t decipher, then changed back without a trace as soon as he turned his attention back to the Freak. He told her to go ahead and get some food, and that he had some business to attend to before he could eat, but it wouldn’t take long and he’d join her soon. She smiled and hugged him one more time before running off into the cafeteria. So much for my peaceful meal.

Once Freak was gone, General Cross started heading straight towards me. Not keen on finding out what he wanted, I tried to slip away, but he caught up to me before I could make a clean getaway.

“Are you Yu Kanda?” he inquired without even a hint of politeness.

“What’s it to you?” I retorted in a similar manner.

“Watch your tone, punk. Are you Yu Kanda, yes or no?”

“Yeah.”

“And you’re the one they assigned to _take care of_ Akumako if something happens?”

“Yeah, and?”

“I need you to do something for me.” Without waiting for a response, he continued, “I won’t ask you to disobey orders, but I need you to promise me that you won’t execute her unless there’s absolutely no other option.”

“I don’t get what you’re asking,” I said bluntly. “If she goes psycho, I kill her. That’s it.”

General Cross muttered something under his breath that sounded quite crude, then rephrased his request, “I’m saying don’t kill her unless you don’t have a choice. Try to help her, _save her_ , before you resort to execution. If there’s a chance to bring her back from the edge, I want you to promise that you’ll take it.”

“Why’re you asking me to do that?”

The General’s eye grew sad as he replied, “Akumako is a sweet, good girl. It’s not her fault that she is what she is. She’s tough, but she needs someone on her side to advocate for her, to help protect her when she needs it, and to save her should she wander too close to the dark side.”

“Then you do it!” I refused, “I’m not interested in doing your job for you!”

“ _I_ can’t. That’s why I’m asking _you_. There’s… restrictions, you could say, that make it impossible for me to keep Akumako safe like I want to. But you… It’s already part of your job to keep an eye on her. Please, kid, I’m begging you.”

I wanted to reject his plea and walk away. Killing the Freak was my job. Protecting her was none of my business. Yet, something in the way the General spoke tugged at me. General Cross had a reputation, and his behaviour regarding the Freak didn’t match up. “Why are you so desperate to protect her?”

The General looked around, like he thought someone might be watching us. “I’ll tell you, if you swear to never tell anyone else, especially Akumako.”

“Fine.”

* * *

 

 

 _I failed._ The thought hurt. _I failed._ The clawing, burning feeling in my chest only got worse as it sunk in. _If only I’d done something differently, maybe it wouldn’t have gone this way._ If I hadn’t been so callous, would things be different? If I’d accepted the olive branch sooner, would anything change? If I’d just told her the truth, would she have been spared?

I should have told her. If no one else was going to, I should have. Even if it went against orders, she deserved to know. But whenever I considered it, I decided against it. ‘It’s best if she doesn’t know,’ I would tell myself, ‘Everyone’s better off.’ What bullcrap.

_I’m just a coward. _

* * *

 

Seven Years Ago 

It was my birthday. Actually, yesterday was my birthday. Today was the party I never wanted. But why exactly did the Order throw a birthday party a day late? Because there was a second birthday the next day. Rather than putting together two separate parties, they just had one on the day in between. And whose birthday was spliced with mine? Take a wild guess.

I actually didn’t care about sharing my birthday with Akumako. I just hated the prospect of a party. I’m antisocial on my best day, and bordering on homicidal the rest of the time.

Over the last year, the way I saw Akumako had changed. Of course, I still couldn’t stand being around her for more than a few minutes and I was just as cold as always, but she wasn’t “Freak” to me anymore. I’m not sure what it was - maybe what General Cross told me - but now, she wasn’t just an assignment, or the anathema I used to see. Somehow, she seemed more human.

Be that as it may, everyone else here was human and I didn’t feel any compulsion to give _them_ presents!

Of course, being me, I sat and sulked alone in the corner throughout the whole party, watching everyone else give Akumako gifts, like stupid little dolls and hair clips with sparkly bunnies on them. All stuff I knew she’d never touch again after today. Anyone with any common sense would know she wasn’t interested that kind of thing.

I fiddled with the box tucked under my heavy coat, wanting to just give it to her and get it over with. For the fifth time, I grabbed it, intending to get up and hand it to Akumako, but yet again, I let go and settled back against the wall. _Dammit,_ I silently cursed, _Why is this so hard? It really shouldn’t be. Just stand up, and give her the box. Easy._ By the time everyone had dispersed to get back to work, I still hadn’t moved from my corner. Now I was alone, swearing at myself for missing my shot.

I returned to my room and left the ungiven gift on the bedside table. To pass the time, I sat down to sharpen and clean Mugen. The task, ordinarily taking only fifteen minutes, took much longer than usual. I couldn’t understand why I kept losing focus. Countless times, I caught myself sitting still just staring at the gleaming blade. I quickly finished and tried meditating instead, only to have my mind wander to places I didn’t want it to go.

 _Maybe I should just go to bed,_ I thought. Deciding that was the best option, I took off my uniform and climbed under the covers. But I couldn’t fall asleep. I couldn’t get comfortable. My eyes wouldn’t stay closed. My mind wouldn’t stop drifting back to Akumako and her present. No matter how many times I banished the thought, the picture came back, with me giving Akumako the box and her smiling. When she wasn’t being a pest, she had a really nice smile.

I laid there, restlessly daydreaming, until the sky outside turned from black to grey. Tired, but unable to fall asleep, I got out of bed and got dressed for the day, planning to go straight to the cafeteria for breakfast then go train. As I was putting on my boots, the box on my nightstand once again caught my attention.

I grabbed the box and dashed out of the room. I walked down the hall to Akumako’s door and raised my hand to knock, but I froze at the last second. I stood there for a few minutes, torn between my compulsion to give my present and the urge to flee. I groaned and returned to my room. I grabbed a scrap of paper and scrawled **‘Akumako - Happy Birthday,’** then tied it on with a cord. I returned to Akumako’s door and left the box outside, once again cursing at myself as I walked away.

* * *

 

 _How gutless,_ I reflected on the uninvited memory, _I’ve always been such a spineless coward when it comes to her! I couldn’t even give her a damn birthday present! Still, the way she smiled…_ I remembered how excited Akumako was when she burst into the cafeteria with the box of caramels I’d left her, showing everyone the present from ‘some mysterious stranger.’ She was so happy. _Would she have been that happy if she knew it was me?_ My eyes were begun to sting, surely from the cold. _What would she think if she knew I was looking for her?_

The burning in my legs and throat forced me to stop running. I leaned against a nearby tree and fished my waterskin out from under my coat. After drinking and letting the aching in my muscles dissipate, I continued down the road, slower than before, but calling for Akumako once again.

A older man driving a horse and cart appeared out of the fog ahead of me, then pulled to a stop. “What’s got ye runnin’ like that, lad?” the man asked me, “Ye look like ye’ go’ the Devil on your heels.”

“I’m looking for someone,” I replied quickly, “Have you seen a young woman with long red hair and blue eyes? She’s been missing since yesterday.”

“Red hair, you say? This _is_ Ireland, laddie. There’s quite a few young women about like that.”

“Not _that_ kind of red! It’s crimson, like blood. And there’s a star in her right eye.”

“Why on Earth would a lass have a star in her eye?”

“Have you seen her or not?!” I snapped, “Her life could be at stake!”

“‘fraid I haven’t, lad. I’ll keep an eye out for yer red-haired lassie, though. Good luck to ye.” He snapped the reins and the cart squeaked back into motion, leaving me alone in the cold, grey gloom.

I had to find her. Not for the Order, not for General Cross, not for anyone else. It wasn’t about them. What they wanted didn’t matter anymore. I had to find her before she was lost forever.

* * *

 

Five Years Ago 

“Well done on your mission, you two,” Komui praised us, “You did a great job.”

“It would’ve gone faster if you hadn’t sent _her_ with me,” I grumbled, frustrated after having spent an entire uncomfortable week in the field dealing with Akumako’s antics.

“Kanda, you know I can’t send a child into the field alone. In a few years, once you have more experience, maybe, but it’s not a risk I’m comfortable taking yet.”

I scoffed in annoyance, “Whatever.”

Komui started rambling about something, prompting me to zone out, though my mind snapped back to attention when he said, “Akumako, are you alright?”

She had been oddly quiet since we got back. I glanced at her, and she did look a bit ashen.

“I’m fine,” she mumbled, “Just a bit tired. I think the week is just now catching up with me.”

Komui looked her over. “If you say so. Why don’t you go get some dinner then head to bed?”

“Yeah, turning in early sounds like a good idea,” she agreed listlessly, “See you tomorrow, then.” She tripped on her way out the door.

As soon as she was out of earshot, Komui turned to me. “I take it everything went smoothly with her, then?”

“Apart from being annoying as always, she was fine,” I shrugged. “Nothing noteworthy.” Several loud thuds caught my attention. “The hell was that?” I bolted out the door to find Akumako sprawled out at the base of the stairs outside the office. “Akumako!” I blurted, forgetting in a moment of panic to call her something else.

I knelt down, shaking her and calling her name a few times, but she didn’t stir. I rolled her onto her side and touched her forehead, blazingly hot and disgustingly sticky. Once I looked at my hand, I realised she was bleeding. The colour matched that of her hair so well that I hadn’t noticed it initially. I put pressure on the wound with my sleeve and searched my pockets for the roll of bandages I carried in case of an emergency.

Komui finally emerged from his office just as I finished wrapping her head. “Is everything al- oh dear…”

I cast him a sharp glare, irritated with his lack of urgency. “She’s sick. I’m taking her to the infirmary.” Without waiting for acknowledgement, I picked Akumako up and carried her away, careful to not jostle her too much, in case her tumble had hurt her worse than I could tell. _She’s really light,_ I thought, _I thought she’d weigh more. Maybe it’s because she’s sick._

As soon as I walked into the infirmary with an unconscious, bleeding girl in my arms, the Head Nurse went into a tizzy, initially assuming I was the one who’d done the damage. Once I explained that she had a fever and had fallen down the stairs, she calmed down and stopped scolding me. She took Akumako from me and got her set up in a bed. I silently watched the Head Nurse treat Akumako’s head injury and check for anything I may have missed, which fortunately, only amounted to some bruises and scrapes. The older woman cleaned her up and tucked her in with a cold compress on her forehead. Once she was done, I asked the Nurse, “Will she be okay?”

“Most likely, so long as we can keep her temperature down.”

I nodded absently. “Good. Good.” I wasn’t sure what to do. Stay? Leave? The Head Nurse seemed to know exactly what I was thinking.

“You can stay for a little while if you want, so long as you don’t cause a ruckus.”

I wound up sitting next to Akumako’s bed nearly all day for the next week, waiting for her to wake up. There wasn’t any real reason why. I really only left to get my meals or when I was forced out to go to bed. When I was away, I would feel uneasy, and found myself inevitably drawn back to the ward, usually with a book or bowl of miso in my hands for Akumako. If the Nurse was busy, I’d feed her, and then I’d read to her quietly. Sometimes, I’d just look at her. In spite of everything, she looked peaceful. I wondered what she was dreaming about, or if she was dreaming about anything at all.

 _What would she think if she opened her eyes and saw me sitting here?_ I wondered, _What would she think if she could read my mind?_ Recently, I’d come to accept something that completely changed things for me. Part of me wanted to find out how she would react if I told her, but the more sensible side of me was content with imagining.

“You perplex me, you know?” I said quietly when it was just the two of us, “You’re so annoying and sometimes I want to stab you, but… I kinda like it. The things you do, I mean. Your stupid antics, the way we interact… You remind me of Alma. You’re a lot like him in some ways, but at the same time, you’re totally different. I think that’s part of why I was always so angry when I looked at you. But now… I feel better when I’m with you, even when you’re being a pest. I just like being around you. You’re something special.” I went silent for a minute, hoping nobody heard my rambling. “You don’t know this, but I’m supposed to watch you, just in case you turn into something bad. And General Cross came to me a few years ago asking me to protect you and keep you safe, and try to save you if it looks like it’s happening. I’m gonna do just that, but not because I was told to. Do you wanna know why?” She didn’t stir. I moved over so I was sitting next to her on the bed, and I bent over to touch me forehead to hers. “I’m gonna protect you because I don’t want to lose you. Not ever, Akumako.” I brushed her cheek with my thumb and whispered, “I love you.”

* * *

 

 _“The Black Order are the ones who_ murdered _your family!”_

_Just ask she was about to take my hand, Akumako withdrew, shock and hurt etched on her face. “No, that’s not true,” she denied, “It’s not, is it, Kanda?”_

_“Of course not!” I shouted, desperate to get out of this place together, “That’s insane! Come on, let’s get out of here.” I reached out to grab her hand and pull her through the door, but I couldn’t touch her. My hand went right through her._

_“I won’t let you touch her, Exorcist!” the blue-haired brat shouted at me. “Look, Akumako! Look what they made you forget!” The girl pointed at a scene she conjured._

_We both watched as a beautiful woman hid a tiny, crying Akumako. The cries of akuma and loud blasts of cannons and gunfire filled the air. “Don’t worry, Akumako,” the woman comforted the child, “The fighting will stop soon. We’ll keep you safe.”_

_“You promise, Mama?”_

_“I promise.”_

_The woman walked away to guard the door. Akumako’s crying got louder as the clamor outside got closer. “I don’t like this, Mama! I wanna go home!” she sobbed as another akuma gave its death rattle._

_“We will, Koko. Don’t worry. Just try to stay quiet.” Akumako did her best to silence her bawling, but she didn’t do very well._

_After one last gunshot, everything went silent. “What’s happening, Mama?” Her mother didn’t say anything. “Mama?” With a loud bang, a massive hole appeared in the door and dark blood sprayed across the floor. “Mama?!”_

_“Be quiet!” Her mother hissed just before the door was kicked in. Akumako squeezed her eyes shut and covered her ears. Akumako’s mother looked at the intruder and said, unfazed, “So it’s you.”_

_General Cross pointed his gun at Akumako’s mother. “Shiori. I wish this was a happy reunion.”_

_“Spare the sweet talk and just get this over with.”_

_“First tell me where she is.”_

_“Who?”_

_“My daughter, Shiori. Where is she?”_

_“Why would I tell you? You’ll just kill her, won’t you?”_

_General Cross cocked his gun. “What kind of monster do you take for? Tell me where she is.”_

_“Just shoot me, Marian. Find her yourself.” The end of Cross’s gun touched the woman’s forehead and she smiled, “She’s got lovely red hair, just like you.” Bang!_

_“MAMA!” Akumako screamed, drawing the General’s attention, “Help me! I’m scared! Mama! Mama!” He walked over toward the source of the shrieking and found the little girl. He knelt down and started comforting her, wiping away her tears with a handkerchief. “Hey there, little one, it’s okay. The monsters are gone now. Let’s have a look at you.” He pushed her hood down and touched her hair, deep red, just like her mother had said. “You’re a pretty one. You’ll grow up to be a real beauty, I think. Just like your mother. Come on,” he said and picked her up,_ _"I'll be looking after you from now on. My name is General Marian Cross. What's your name, little one?"_

_“Akumako.”_

_“STOP IT!” the real Akumako screamed and the scene evaporated. She was on her knees, sobbing, “That can’t be real! It has to be a lie! Please, tell me it’s a lie, Kanda!”_

_I was absolutely dumbstruck. What could I say?_

_“Kanda, please!”_

_“I… I don’t-”_

_“He can’t say it because it’s true. The Order had your mother and all the rest murdered and took you away from those that were left, all so they could have a shiny new weapon.”_

_“Did you know, Kanda?” She gave me a pleading look, her eyes filled with agony, “Please tell me you didn’t.”_

_“No!” I finally managed to blurt, “I only knew what Cross told me, and he didn’t say anything about-”_

_“That’s what he made you promise not to tell me, isn’t it?” she interjected, pain turning into anger, “That he murdered my mother?”_

_“No! I didn’t know anything about that!” I denied, “He just told me that he was your father! He never said anything about your mother!”_

_“Why should I believe that?” The brat perched on the other door started grinning. I realised too late that we’d walked right into her web._

_“Akumako, you know me! I wouldn’t lie to you!” I tried to reason with her, “That brat is trying to trick you! This is what she wants!”_

_“Trick me into what? Realising that the Order has been deceiving me my whole life, not just about what I am, but about what they did to get me? And about my own damned parentage? I couldn’t even know that?!”_

_“Please, Akumako, just come back and we can work this out!”_

_“No!” she shouted, and I stumbled back as though I’d been shoved, “I won’t go back to being a slave of the Black Order ever again!”_

_“Don’t do this!” I yelled back as I was flung unwillingly through the door, “Akumako!”_

* * *

 

I finally collapsed to my knees. I couldn’t run anymore. I couldn’t shout. I couldn’t keep searching. It wasn’t just because of exhaustion. For the first time in nearly a decade, I was on the verge of breaking down. I’d failed. The Order, General Cross, Akumako, myself, everyone. “I failed,” my voice broke, “I failed.” I repeated it over and over as everything sunk in. “Forgive me,” I whispered as the first tears fell into the dirt. “Forgive me. Forgive me.”

It hurt. I couldn’t breathe. It felt like I was being crushed. I might’ve asked someone to stab me if would make this feeling go away, this horrible emptiness that came with knowing I might never see Akumako again, I’d never hear her tease me, or see her impish grin or that sweet smile when she got my birthday presents. It was excruciating knowing that now, she was to be considered the enemy, and ally of the Millennium Earl, and I may one day have to fight against her. It killed me.

I’d lost her.

 


	11. Puzzle Pieces

I bolted upright with a feral snarl. My arm was cocked back, ready to swing at the nearest thing and shred it, my weapon having activated in apparent response to my sudden rage. It took a moment to realise that there was nothing to attack. I was alone, save for the company of my stuffed animals and the sheer curtains fluttering around my bed. Coming back into reality, I fought to stuff my anger back into its box where it belonged. I threw the covers off and paced the room in my wrinkled kimono, chanting, “It was just a dream. It’s just a dream.” Surely, that’s all it was. It had to be. Frazzled as I was, my mind must have made up all that insanity to justify everything. It was just a dream. Just a dream. But it felt so real. Too real.

A firm knock on the door grabbed my attention. “Come in,” I called, expecting to greet Road, but instead finding the face of an unknown maid with a pile of neatly folded clothes in her arms.

“Good morning, Miss Akumako,” the maid greeted me robotically, “I thought you would still be sleeping. Mistress Road sent me to wake you and help you dress.”

“I can dress myself,” I grunted irritably. Despite my clear denial of her assistance, the maid began untying the misshapen obi behind my back. “I said-”

“I heard you, Miss. But I must obey Mistress Road.”

I rolled my eyes but let her continue. It was too trivial to bother arguing. _Why am I so testy this morning?_ I asked myself, _I didn’t snap at the maids who helped me dress last night._ Thinking for a moment, I shrugged, _I was pretty out of sorts, I suppose. Didn’t have the energy to be quarrelsome._

Thinking about nothing in particular, I couldn’t help but feel a bit on edge. Something wasn’t right, but what was it? The new surroundings? The maid’s robotic, hollow manner? The uneasy tingle in the cross on my back?

“A dressing robe for you, Miss.” The maid held out a plain white robe for me, clearly expecting me to wear it while she laid out the clothes she’d brought in for me. I watched, curious as to what I’d be wearing, when she set down some strangely-shaped contraption made of wire and stiff fabric, and didn’t look like it would fit on any part of a normal person’s anatomy.

“What in god’s name is that?” I asked, my nose wrinkling in confusion and lingering irritation.

The maid gave me an odd look. “It’s a corset, Miss.”

“ _That’s_ what they are?!”

“Yes, of course.”

“Jesus Christ, I’m not wearing that!”

“But Miss,” the maid protested and held up the shell of the multi-layered dress she’d brought, “It’s necessary if you want to fit into your dress.”

I took a look at the dress and all the layers that went with it, immediately displeased with the uncomfortable-looking costume. “You’re not getting me into that.”

“But Mistress Road chose it. She believes it would suit you very well.”

“I’m not wearing it.”  
“Miss Akumako-”

“It’s not happening. Go find something else.”

“I must obey Mistress Road!” The maid reached out and grabbed my arm to pull me closer, likely so she could hook me into that corset monstrosity. Upon contact, however, my demon eye and Innocence weapon burst to life. For a split second, both of us were shocked, until I actually looked at her and saw the violet aura around her. Recognising the akuma, I lashed out and killed it with hardly a thought. Then she was gone.

I expected to be a bit shaken, having had such a close encounter, but I didn’t. The usual distaste or irritation I normally felt after killing akuma never came. Instead, I felt something more like exhilaration mixed with enmity. Joy and hate. I looked at my tarnished claws, mildly befuddled. _That’s new._

After struggling to shut my weapon down, I rummaged through the room, hoping to find something other than that dress to wear. A shirt, some trousers, perhaps? Sadly, there was nothing other than the gown and the kimono I’d been wearing all night, and the wardrobe only contained a lace-trimmed nightgown. _Where’s the stuff I arrived here in? I want my shirt, and my trousers, and my boots!_ As much as I looked, they weren’t there. “Where are my clothes?!”

Another knock tapped through the door. “Akumako? Are you up yet?” Ah. It was Road. Without waiting for an invitation, she strolled in, “I know I sent- Oh, you’ve killed the maid.”

“She was an akuma,” I informed her, “I had to.”

She shrugged ambivalently, “Oh well. I didn’t really like her anyway.” She cast a critical violet eye to my white robe. “Couldn’t you at least have let her dress you before killing her?”

“Like I told her, I can dress myself.”

“Haven’t you ever worn this kind of thing before?”

“No.”

“Oh.” The thought apparently hadn’t occurred to her that I’d never worn clothes customary of women in this age. “I suppose corsets and petticoats _would_ be a bit of a hinderance in your line of work. In any case, they’re hard to put on by yourself. If you’ve never worn this kind of thing, it might be nearly impossible.”

“I’m not wearing that, Road,” I said bluntly. Frankly, I was getting tired of saying it.

“But it’s so pretty! It would look great on you!”

“I don’t wear that kind of thing. I wear shirts and trousers.”

Road made a displeased face. “That’s not very feminine, you know.”

I quirked a scarlet eyebrow. “So? I never cared before. Why now?”

“Don’t you want to look pretty though, now that you can?”

I shrugged, “Not particularly. I’d rather be comfortable and able to move if I need to.”

Road sighed, understanding that this was one argument that wasn’t worth fighting. “Alright, alright. I’ll have a maid find you something else to wear that’s more to your tastes.” I grunted in response and turned away when she walked out to find another maid.

It was a bit vexing. Exactly _what_ wasn’t easy to define without the use of ‘everything’ though. This situation was nowhere near normal. I lost control of something I didn’t know was in me, fine. I could understand that well enough. But everything after that felt off. After running away, I just happened to be found by a young girl in the middle of the night in the middle of nowhere. That only happens in novels. That dream I had couldn’t possibly be true, yet it felt so corporeal, even now, long after I’d woken and should have forgotten it. Logic said it was nothing more than a dream, but something else in my mind proclaimed it to be true. Again, only in novels. If it truly was somehow real, why was Road so insistent that I went with her? Why did she act so familiar with me? What was with her excessive generosity? It was a bit unsettling. The akuma maid could have just been a coincidence, but my inner Exorcist doubted it. I suspected there was something strange going on.

_Jesus Christ, my life reads like a penny dreadful!_

* * *

 

Once Road got it into her head that I didn’t want to wear skirts or dresses of any kind, she finally brought me something suitable to wear. I fussed a bit with the clothes as we walked down the hall. They still weren’t quite what I was used to, what with the different materials and purely aesthetic points. The large, loose ruffles down the front of my shirt kept distracting me, the collar was tighter than I liked, and the indigo silk was so thin and light that it felt like the lightest breeze would tear it. Hardly practical for someone like me. I found that the trousers restricted the length of my strides quite uncomfortably. Again, impractical. At least I’d gotten my old boots back, though Road was adamant that I had to allow them to be cleaned and polished up before wearing them, seeing as they were far too beat-up and dirty to be worn. It didn’t matter to me either way, so I allowed it. I just wanted my comfortable, sturdy boots back.

“Do you like your new clothes, Akumako?” Road asked as she walked beside me.

“They’ll work for now,” I replied, “They’re not very functional, though.”

“It’s not like you’re going to be fighting in them.”

“Road, everything I own has to be suitable for fighting. It’s what I do.”

“But you don’t have to fight here. It’s totally safe. Nobody’s going to attack you here.”

“I had an encounter just earlier with that maid. Enemies are everywhere, and if you don’t find them, they find you.”

Road giggled for a moment, “That maid wasn’t there to attack you, Akumako.”

“She was an akuma, Road. You probably don’t know-”

“Yes, I do,” she interrupted me and denied my assumption, “I know about you and the Black Order. Why would you think I don’t know about akuma too?”

My mind went back to the dream, the only time she ever mentioned the Order. “So that was real?”

“What, the dream?” I nodded. “Of course it was. I thought you knew that.”

“It’s not the easiest thing to believe, you know.” A touch of anger began bubbling back up, this time accompanied by a hint of sadness. Pushing it back down, I continued chatting, trying to keep a casual tone, “How did you get in my head?”

Road smiled deviously, “I’m a witch!” I raised an eyebrow in skepticism. “Alright, I’m not a witch. I just have power over dreams. Everyone in my family has some kind of special ability like that.”

_Everyone?_ I thought, _If it was just her, I might’ve thought Innocence might be involved, but not her entire family. I don’t know how that’s possible. It just doesn’t add up._

“Trying to wrap your brain around it?” she broke me out of my abstraction.

“It’s that obvious?”

“It’s reasonable. I told you we all had powers, then you got all quiet. It makes sense that you’d be thinking about it.”

“Fair enough.” Silence reigned for a few steps before I revived the conversation, “So in that dream… Was it all true?”

“Sadly, yes.”

“So General Cross… He was my father the whole time. And he killed my mother.” I barked out a cold laugh, “Well, I can see why he didn’t bring _that_ up in conversation.” I didn’t let my thoughts linger, hoping to avoid another outburst. “So why did you take such an interest in me? Did you know my mother or something?”

“Of course I did! I knew you too. Your mother was adopted into our family before you were born, and you were born one of us. You actually spent a lot of time in this very mansion.”

“I did?” I looked around in surprise. “I don’t remember it at all.”

“You were a little kid when you were taken away, and most of your memories from that time have been locked away in your mind by that General, so it’s not surprising you don’t remember. But didn’t your room feel familiar?”

“More than a little.” I stayed silent, absorbing the new information, but something didn’t sit right. “Road, how could you possibly have known me or my mother?”

“Pardon?”

“You’re what, thirteen? I was four years old when General Cross took me. You wouldn’t have been born for another two years. You couldn’t have known either of us.”

Road gave me a smile and said sweetly, “I’m older than I look.”

After that, Road didn’t answer any more questions. Instead, she would redirect the conversation or ask me about what kinds of sweets I liked. What questions I still had were few, and didn’t seem worth hiding to me. I just wanted to know how she found me. And I wanted to know, if she was really in control, why had Kanda been in my dream?

* * *

 

After an uneventful breakfast, Road led me out to the garden. “Everyone’s so excited to see you!” she told me with a huge grin on her face, “A few will be meeting you for the first time, but the others know you.”

“It’s the same to me either way. I don’t remember anyone.”

“Aren’t you excited at all? It’s a family reunion!”

“I don’t know what I’m supposed to feel, Road, especially with everything that’s been happening in just the last day.”

“Right, right. Perspective. I understand.” Road patted my arm as if to comfort me. “Everything will be fine, Akumako. Once you’re settled, it’ll all work out, no worries.”

I nodded absently, trying to shake the uneasy tremble in my chest. I wished I could be as relaxed as Road was. On the outside, I probably looked as calm as I ordinarily did, if not a bit irritated. Inside, on the other hand, I was a mess. I felt cracked and confused and so, so lost. I desperately needed to think and process everything that had happened to me, but my mind was too jumbled to focus. “Why is this happening?” I mumbled under my breath.

“What was that?”

“Nothing. I just don’t understand why all of this is happening.”

“Why all of what is happening?”

“All of _this_ !” I gestured around as though my point was hiding in the tall hedges around us, “All the secrets, all the lies, all the crap with the Black Order. All the deceptions about my past and my identity and my family… And everything about… just… _me._ Why am I like this? Why did I have to be born a Demon Exorcist? Why-”

“Akumako, stop it,” Road interjected, “You’ll drive yourself mad thinking like that. We’ll meet the rest of the family out here in the gardens, then we’ll explain everything to you. I promise. Everything will make sense.”

“Right,” I nodded slowly, “I… Yeah, you’re right. Sorry for freaking out a bit. I’m not quite… you know…”

“You’re going through a rough patch,” Road smiled at me, “I know. But you’re tough. You’ll get through it. You’re strong, and with a little faith, you’ll be able to fight your way out of anything.”

“I know,” I smiled bitterly, “It’d just be nice if for once, I didn’t have to.”

Road blinked her big violet eyes a few times, looking surprised. Perhaps it hadn’t crossed her mind that I wanted something other than battles and warfare, probably for the same reason I had banished the idea long ago. It would never come to pass. Whatever she was thinking, she didn’t say it. She didn’t say anything until we turned into a large, grassy garden lined with roses and surrounded by tall hedge walls. A pure white gazebo stood proudly in the center with a table set for tea and several people seated around it, clearly waiting for us. A pang of nostalgia struck me suddenly, as though I had seen such a scene before. Then again, I probably had.

When we entered the garden, one of the attendees rose to his feet; A rather gaunt-looking man with long, curly dark hair tied back into a ponytail. _Kanda wears it so much better,_ I thought.

“Road!” he cried with too much enthusiasm as he approached us with outstretched arms, “There you are, my darling! We were beginning to wonder what was keeping you!” He hugged Road tightly then turned to look at me. “My goodness, is that little Akumako? How good it is to see you’re alright!” I stiffened when he embraced me as well. “You’ve grown up to be so pretty.” I fought back the urge to shudder. The comment itself was innocent enough, but his tone gave me the creeps.

“You’re smothering her, Sheril,” another man chastised from the gazebo, “Give the lady some space.” I was quite grateful to be released from Sheril’s grip, so much that I almost missed the voice that had freed me.

_Hold on,_ I realized, _I think I’ve heard that voice before_. I looked up at the gazebo, making eye contact with a very handsome man with slicked-back hair, a suit, and a cheeky smile. “I know you,” I said, “You’re that man I met on the train a month ago, Tyki Mikk!”

“Indeed I am,” he confirmed with a small nod, “Might I say, it’s a pleasure to meet you again, Miss Akumako.”

“You too,” I replied out of courtesy, “But what are you doing here?”

“Isn’t it obvious? This is my family. Sheril is my older brother, and Road is my lovely niece.”

My gaze flicked between the three a few times. “How the hell is that obvious?”

“Do mind your language, my dear,” Sheril interjected, “It won’t do for a courtesan to be so coarse.”

“But I’m not a courtesan.”

“Oh, don’t force her into such a dull role already, brother,” Tyki complained, “She’s only just gotten here. Let her settle in before trying to make her be all proper and boring.”

“Yes!” Road agreed, “Tea first!” Road grabbed my hand and pulled me over to the gazebo, making me sit at the table between her and Tyki.

“Fine, you two win,” Sheril conceded without much of a fight, “But please do mind your tongue, my dear.”

“Sure, I’ll try.” I mumbled, somewhat baffled by the array of pastel sweets that looked fancier than perhaps anything anyone in the Black Order owned. Well, not counting some of General Cross’s wines. Road poured some fragrant tea for me into an unnecessarily delicate and ornate teacup. I almost didn’t want to pick it up for fear that it would break in my hand. I only ever drank from sturdy cups and mugs, not dainty china. I sipped the tea cautiously, unused to the mellow, rosy flavor, rather than the grassy-tasting green tea I normally drank. The new experience was pleasant, don’t get me wrong, but I felt uncomfortable. I missed my sturdy, simple cups and my grassy tea, and I missed the people I used to drink it with.

“So, Akumako dear,” Sheril crooned, “You must have so many questions for us.”

I took a tiny sip of my tea. “Some, yeah.” I very gingerly set the fragile teacup down on its saucer. “First off, who are you people, exactly?”

Sheril looked aghast. “I thought surely my dear Road would have told you by now-”

“You’re my family, I know,” I interrupted, “But that’s not what I was meant. She said you all have powers. And you know about the war between Exorcists and akuma. Normal people don’t know about that.”

“Interrupting is unbecoming of a lady,” Sheril scolded me with a scowl. Tyki chuckled beside me. “Something to add, little brother?”

“Oh nothing. I just find it amusing how you offered answers and then ignored Akumako’s question.” Tyki turned his head towards me slightly and shot me a grin.

Sheril glared at Tyki and hissed, “I was going to answer, if you would just be patient.” Sheril looked at me and his expression softened. “Akumako, what my dear daughter told you was true. We all do have rather special gifts, just like she said, and our family knows quite a bit about the Holy War. Perhaps more than you do.”

“I kinda doubt that,” I said, “I am… _was_ an Exorcist. I was in the thick of it. I think I would be a bit more knowledgeable on the subject than normal people.”

“Most certainly. But Akumako, who said anything about us being _normal_?” Sheril chuckled at my confusion. “Sweet girl, our family has been a part of the war since long before anyone you’ve ever known was born. We’ve been around even longer than the Black Order, and we don’t have anyone keeping secrets and whispering lies in our ears while sending us to do their dirty work.”

“But then who-”

“Hush, my dear,” he silenced me. Didn’t he just tell me that interrupting was rude? “Our patriarch should be arriving soon. I think perhaps he might be better suited to answering some of these questions.”

I didn’t like that. Sheril’s syrupy tone, his catty grin, his obviously carefully-chosen words… It unsettled me. The negging feeling I had ignored all morning returned with a vengeance, urging me to run away as fast as I could.

_Hurry!_ the little voice cried, _Get out of here while you still have a chance!_

“Alright, Sheril,” I agreed coolly, “I’ll wait until he arrives, but I do expect my answers.”

Sheril’s thin smile widened, seemingly pleased that I had conceded so easily. Out of the corner of my eye, though, I thought I saw Tyki give me a strange look. Perhaps he picked up on the shift in my speech.

Something wasn’t right. I knew that for sure now, but I couldn’t tell what. _Sheril said they’ve been involved with the war longer than the Order,_ I reminded myself. _But there aren’t any organizations that old, are there? The only thing I can think of that’s older than the Order is the Innocence itself. What could he have possibly meant?_ I stared down into my teacup as though hoping the answer I sought laid at the bottom. _What else is older than the Order?_ I swirled my tea and watched a tiny stray leaf dance around. _Humanity, perhaps? No, that’s not it._ I set the cup back down and furrowed by brows as I continued to watch the leaf drift. _Let’s see… The Innocence was supposedly made by God, right? But God isn’t the answer either._ I was tempted to hit myself. I knew that all they puzzle pieces I needed were right in front of me. _Dammit! I’m smarter than this! Go through the story, Akumako! God made the original Innocence crystal and gave it to the original humans. Then it was shattered and scattered across the world for some reason in Noah’s flood… I think. Then the Order was made to find the Innocence pieces and use them to fight…_ My inner thought trail stopped right as the tea leaf settled at the bottom of the cup.

The Millennium Earl.

_I need to get out of here, now!_ I was about to excuse myself to ‘take a short walk’ and make my escape, but apparently I had realised what was going on too late.

“Good morning, my dear Noah!” My blood froze at the sound of the jovial voice behind me. I hadn’t heard it since I was very small, but I recognized it. “And to our treasured Akumako, welcome home!”


End file.
